Cryptomundo
for Bigfoot, Lake Monsters, Sea Serpents and More

As a comedian, Bobcat Goldthwait can seem like a colicky baby, spitting punch lines punctuated by random screams. As a filmmaker, however, he’s more focused and less predictable, channeling his choleric style into pointed satires on American society that sometimes hit their marks with uncomfortable directness.

Which is to say that restraint has not been one of his watchwords — until now. With “Willow Creek,” a found-footage yarn set in Humboldt County, Calif., Mr. Goldthwait exercises so much caution that you want to get behind his characters and push. This impatience stems at least partly from expectations cultivated by a long line of similar pseudo-documentary creep-outs — curious seekers of the supernatural getting more than they bargained for — dating all the way back to “The Blair Witch Project” in 1999. As if in homage to that ingenious groundbreaker, “Willow Creek” hugs the template with a deliberation that has the unfortunate effect of encouraging our brains to dance ahead of the script.

Simplicity itself, the story sends a Bigfoot fanatic (Bryce Johnson) and his skeptical girlfriend (Alexie Gilmore) deep into the Six Rivers National Forest, armed only with a video camera and youthful enthusiasm. Their destination is the site of a supposed Sasquatch sighting recorded in a 1967 film fragment, but local monster experts (delightfully played by residents of the area) are cautionary. By the time our couple set up camp and night descends, we’ve been teased much too long to be satisfied with anything less than a rampaging, hairy biped.