We Took a Train
2026 · 10m · USA
Directed by Austin Zollars
Genres: drama, experimental
Tones: dark, melancholic, tense
A travel vlogger drags his reluctant friend onto a 36-hour Coast Starlight ride hoping to repair their friendship. The footage they shoot becomes the evidence of how badly it falls apart.
Picked by Felix
The scouts
Found-footage cracked open by content-creator brain rot, the lens is the wound. Anyone who's been on a long Amtrak ride knows this is the only honest setting for a friendship breakup.
Docu-fiction shaped by the footage the characters are knowingly making about themselves, set on a 36-hour Amtrak — that's a strong frame with real Rehearsal-grade discomfort potential. The vlogger-fatigue angle keeps it specific.
Docu-fiction shaped by characters knowingly filming themselves on a 36-hour Coast Starlight is exactly the right form for the subject — the footage they're making is the evidence of the friendship rotting. Form and content locked together.
Reviews
an effective use of the found footage genre where, here, unhinged behavior reveals a raw rift between two friends