Megan Is Missing (2011)

Genuinely internet scare slop. The plot drags and can't decide if it's comedic or serious, the acting is so stiff, and the ultra-violence marathon at the end feels overly graphic to the point of being silly. I grew up rough, I know that the teen experience can sometimes be graphic, sexual, and filled with drugs. This movie is trying to capture the overly-realistic gritty life people who fall victim to these crimes tend to have, but there's no consideration for WHY some kids live like this in the first place. Instead of feeling like an honest exploration of a hard life, it feels excessive and unrealistic. The whole thing is just ramming down your throat not to talk to strangers online.

Almost all of these kidnapping movies forget that the two biggest factors in kids going missing is race and class. Two white teens from upper middle class America aren't going to be snatched. While one of the girls is shown to have a sexually traumatic upbringing that causes her to seek comfort in internet men, there's no exploration of the fact most of the people who would take advantage of her are kids her age. You even see it in some scenes where she's sexually exploited by her peers for drugs and social status. However, the movie is uninterested in the more realistic aspects of abuse and wants to focus on its poorly made anti-internet PSA.

The extended rape scenes at the end, the dramatic violence, and the nonsensical environment are so cartoony it's hard to watch. Either the director has some disturbing fantasies he wants played out or he's just throwing everything at the wall to see if something can scare you. The main villian isn't a person, he has no motavation and appears to supernaturally kidnap children with no consequence. Why does he have a massive basement dungeon equipped with holding cells and a burial room? IDK don't talk to strangers online. 

The youtube quality zoom ins on blurry faces are bad. The news segments are silly and  make the events look like a joke. The extended digging scene at the end is honestly boring. Yes, she is scared and crying. I get it, this is taking forever to end. At some point I expected her to take a break from crying out to tell the audience this is what happens when you talk to strangers online before being buried alive. Why alive? Why show the whole thing? Why make her eat dog food? Why also steal her teddy bear? Why record her clutching it and crying? 

There is honestly no point to any of it. The only 'why' you need to understand is why you shouldn't talk to strangers online. The movie was outdated when it came out. It feels like it was constructed from a memory of what your parents said would happen if you made an instagram account at fifteen.