You know who doesn't take requests anymore? DJs, MTV and serial killers.

Well, I can finally say I'm better than all those things, because I do.

I welcome them, in fact. Without reader suggestions, I may have gone years without being kinda entertained by 1998's The Last Broadcast.

Four men enter the New Jersey pine barrens intending to film a live broadcast on the Jersey Devil.

Only one man comes back: Jim Seward, who's arrested and convicted for the brutal murders of his three friends. But documentarian David Beard, concerned by the lack of evidence at Seward's trial, is determined to find the truth behind the massacre in the woods.

Of course, this is all fictional. A documentary-style tale of a group of people traipsing out into the woods to investigate paranormal activity, only to die horribly, The Last Broadcast might remind you of The Blair Witch Project. (Or, if you're a certain breed of movie-watcher, The Bare Wench Project.) If so, congrats, it reminded the Blair Witch people to make their movie, too: The Last Broadcast came first.

It's not what I'd call plagiarism, as they're a lot different in practice than in concept. The Last Broadcast looks very much like an after-the-fact documentary, something that could run between pieces on Bigfoot and crop circles without raising a brow.

This mimicry is a double-edged sword. Technically, it's impressive, but it provides all the thrills of a real documentary with none of the factual interest. It could have used an introduction to the deceased and their killer much sooner -- until we know the people involved in this mysterious crime, the investigation of their fate is hardly engaging.

I'm not sure what it says about me that I want to know these guys before I can get psyched up about them being sliced to ribbons, but I do know The Last Broadcast picks up a lot once it really delves into the doomed characters' own footage.

Most so-so movies fall apart in their last act, but this is when writer/directors Stefan Avalos and Lance Weiler bust out the "it's scarier when you can't really tell what's going on" camera tricks that have become standard in the last decade of pseudo-documentaries.

Then they top it off with a pretty decent twist! It's too bad that instead of making me want to learn the truth, the first hour of The Last Broadcast just made me want a nap.

* Contact Ed Robertson at edwrobertson@gmail.com