"The Blair Witch Project": Six Years Later, Classic or Dud?

i saw it once, it was alright! nothing amazing, but a good fun night at the movie theater, yep.

Given its threadbare budget, I'm of the mindset that it's hugely effective in the creep-out department (that which you don't see is always scarier than any shitty special effect. Consider the original version of "The Haunting" for evidence of same). I saw during the middle of a sunny day in a bustling urban environment, and was still completely creeped out.

Haven't watched it recently (though brought the DVD to work this evening, anticipating a slow evening). May still watch it just to see if it will creep me out (which, during an overnight shift, would make it sort've a dumb thing to do).

Also for the Davey-conquering-Goliath reasons Blount mentioned, I'd say CLASSIC across the board.

And they had a cool Web site.

Given its threadbare budget, I'm of the mindset that it's hugely effective in the creep-out department (that which you don't see is always scarier than any shitty special effect. Consider the original version of "The Haunting" for evidence of same). I saw during the middle of a sunny day in a bustling urban environment, and was still completely creeped out.

this is almost my exact experience, except all I knew of it was a cryptic newspaper ad. I went in the middle of the day, sitting in an almost empty theater and it creeped me out for 2 days. I can't say anything to people who hated it after it got hyped, I'm sure I would've hated it the same way, shame we can't trade experiences.

of people that weren't scared there was always someone who was too dumm or inattentive to pick up all the little details that come out here and there in the beginning and so were immune ("i didn't get it, why were they just staring at the wall at the end?" "uh remember the nutty lady who said that would happen when they were gonna die?" "ohhh ok wow that is creepy")

Huh? No, it's Heather holding the camera. She comes down the stairs and sees Mike in the corner (as foretold by one of the interview subjects earlier in the film), and is -- presumably -- attacked from behind. She drops the camera.

Or that's how I interpretted it.

I ordered it directly from Amazon because I couldn't wait to see it. (If you want to catch it in a cinema here, you have to wait three centuries.) I saw it in on a dark evening all alone in a big house. After the film had ended I thought I could just stand up and go to bed. I stayed away for another two hours.... sitting on the couch unable to move. I was that scared. A year after that I saw it again and I loved it as much but in a different way. I could see some things better , especially the ending was very different because somehow, in my anxiety, I had missed a lot. So yeah definitely CLASSIC. The follow-up was so horrendous, just a ride of laughter and giggles and WTFness.

I think one of the guys who made the film died in a plane crash or something? I think it was the photography guy or something.

Heather was in some workaday romantic comedy shortlly thereafter, but nothing really came of it.

I'm remembering that final scene and getting the shivers just reading this ...

I also saw it before the uberhype kicked in (I think it was on opening night). A good friend is a big horror movie buff so I went with him. I didn't see it a second time until a couple of years later, and it felt significantly less suspenseful when I already knew what was going to happen. With the exception of the final 5-10 minutes, of course.

The follow-up was so horrendous, just a ride of laughter and giggles and WTFness.

I think the original directors/creators weren't involved with the making of the follow-up.

Yeah, they weren't involved at all.

Whenever I watch the film again, I always catch myself thinking: "Oh, I really hope they make it out of there." And then I realise.

Best watched in tandem with the "Curse Of The Blair Witch" mockumentary, which sets everything up perfectly and fills in lots of background detail only touched on briefly in the film.

Confusingly, not only are there several different edits of the film (the VHS was different to the DVD, for example), but they also shot interviews with the parents of the missing students, only shown in tantalising glimpses in the teaser trailers. "Do you believe the occult may be involved in the disappearance of your son?"

Haven't seen the two guys in anything since, but Heather was in a Sci-Fi Channel miniseries called "Taken" about two years ago, which was quite a big thing at the time. I think she killed Max Headroom in it.

Has anyone seen the "rival" movie, "The Last Broadcast"? It's awful.

Yeah, it's truly dreadful.

Scientologist crap.

What the fuck is that supposed to mean?

Very much enjoyed it and yeah, was honestly creeped out by the ending and couldn't readily get to sleep that night of first watching the day got wide release. I've only rewatched it a couple of times since -- I like the creators' commentary on the DVD, they're so casual and funny about it it's a nice contrast!

It's a classic horror film in that it sets up all the dominoes just to knock them over (the detail about the kids facing the corner has, as noted, maximum payoff -- when my theater audience saw Mike standing there in the corner, there was an audible groan of 'oh fuck...' throughout the theater) and that common sense has to be set aside a bit to make it work. As Mr. Blount notes, the whole idea of the hoaxed urban legend is a great touch -- there was a pretty good comic book tie-in with the film that illustrated each of the previous points in the legend via different illustrators rather than doing an adaptation of the story of the film, and the Rustin Parr sequence in particular was strikingly well done. The tie-in fake documentary, with the 'archival' footage of Parr and the seventies "In Search Of..." style bit with the one 'witch,' was pretty slick.

The story itself wouldn't work nowadays for a key reason:

"Hey, we're lost."

"Oh that's easy, I'll just call the police on my cell and then IM a friend of mine."

"Okay thanks."

http://www.haxan.com/

They've made the main site into a group blog of sorts that they update as they do. I think they know lightning will never exactly strike twice again so they just keep on keeping on.

Hehehe, it DID come out in 1999. Clinton's sunset years, pre-9/11, lots of dotcom money in the air, rah rah rah.

"Okay thanks."

The only thing this would really effect is the is-it-hillbillies-or-is-it-a-witch issue. Expect 'wireless reception is down' to become the 'the phone lines are down' of 21st C horror movies.

I'm just saying - modern technology going all haywire and useless is a very very old trope in spooky stories.

Ha!

Damn, I'd completely forgotten about this film. I fucking loved it when it came out and I think I may just buy the DVD right now this second.

Why's the sequal so universally derided? I've never seen it, having decided not to bother when I found out it had no real connection to the original - is it reall so shit?

xpost - yeah I was gonna say, the film's set in a pre-cellphone world isn't it?

Also classic: low-budget and black and white.

Also also classic: sending people out to the lobby to vomit, the first time that's really happened en masse since "Husbands and Wives" yet before "Dancer in the Dark."

Not so classic: the sequel is a piece of shit, and the sole glaring stain on Joe Berlinger's otherwise impeccable documentary resume.

http://kimmydirector.tripod.com/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderpictures/b17.jpg

Do I need to add anything more?

don't waste yer energy, they die anyway.

Blair Witch 2: Book of Shadows was much better.

josh leonard is really good in humpday

most of the haters were the same people who think they are geniuses for outsmarting a horror movie and/or have no imagination

these are the same lame-o's who complain that movies "aren't scary" by which they mean "I didn't feel as if I were in danger" - no shit? you didn't feel directly threatened by stuff on a screen? when I am king these ppl will have plenty to be scared about I tell you

poor Whopper ;_;

ya sorry to hear about that latebloomer

Way to build your strawmen, Bnw and John. I've seen plenty of scary and imaginative horror movies, but BWP just wasn't among them.

Maybe I'm a traditionalist or something, but for me a crappy handheld video camera and goofy "naturalistic" acting can't build enough mood to make me scared. Effective horror isn't really about realism.

I just watched this again. I don't know, it's underwhelming. Any kid who lives near the woods could do the same thing with a camcorder. I guess it's for people who don't spend much time enjoying the outdoors.

Still think "The Last Broadcast" is freakier.

i thought this revive was gonna be about josh leonard's new directorial effort

The Last Broadcast was terrible

adam wingard (you're next, the guest) made a surprise sequel

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=girSv9UH_V8

how terrible

Blech

And i like wingard

Trailers nowadays are so friggin' cliché and loud --- fade in on expo shot, calm bit of dialogue, slo mo montage then BLACK ....Boom! Boom! Slam! rinse and repeat

The only sort of follow-up to the original I could see working is a period horror about the earlier Blair witch folklore, something like The VVitch. This looks like the same movie.

so in the horror thread I've heard one outright pan, one lukewarm praise....anybody else seen the new one?

I enjoyed it. Ultimately it's kinda goofy but there are some good scary moments. The main difference in this one is the obvious (almost self-consciously so) "movie"-ness versus the original's naturalism. The budget is clearly bigger so there are more supernatural shenanigans and the actors are all beautiful and the dialog is clearly scripted. It made me appreciate the improv skills of the actors in the first movie.

Lol just got out. This movie is like if you gave two ten year olds cameras and told them to scream, run in circles, and trip over shit

it reminded me a bit of Exorcist IV, where they threw a bunch of shit from the earlier film(s) into a blender and then amplified it to volume 11.

in the OG Blair Witch, there were several effective sequences where you couldn't see shit because it was audio-only, or the camera was shaking due to a character running, but you still could piece together what was going on via context clues in either the dialogue or sound. Here, it was sometimes impossible to follow what was happening.

couple of effective moments, but the last twenty minutes became infuriating when it was over - to spend that much time to just wind up recycling a bit, bleh.

the sound aggravated me too - knew they'd rely less on practical effects but lord, everything was off of a "Your Horror Film Soundz" CD-R

also lol here's nerds to Matrix the shit out for us: http://screenrant.com/blair-witch-ending-connections-explained/

oh and addendum - didn't like how overplayed the supernatural was. obviously the OG Blair Witch was supernatural as hell, but the entity in the woods fucked with the trio in practical ways. walking around, snapping twigs (or just creating the sound of snapping twigs, more likely), leaving totems, fucking with the tent. then slowly ratcheted up the supernatural by distorting their sense of direction and bringing the house into the woods to lure them in.

here, there's shit like time dilation/travel, permanent darkness, all kinds of Event Horizon shit going on, like God just decided to fuck with people one night

heh thx for that link

I have no idea what people think of Grave Encounters. It's clearly derivative of Blair Witch Project, as are most of these "found footage" thrillers, but I thought it was really solid (the sequel, too). Anyway, Blair Witch redux sounds weirdly similar to some of the stronger points of Grave Encounters, from internet video as bait (I think?) to the bending/stretching of time/permanent night stuff. It's been a couple of years, though.

review of the new one by Jon Dieringer on Letterboxd

A bunch of people from TGI Fridays commercials go camping and stumble upon a maelstrom of artificial video glitches.

The most enticing review I've read yet!

I forgot this last sequel existed until today. it's seriously so bad it created a hole in my brain and walked out

Good read:

https://variety.com/2024/film/news/blair-witch-project-cast-robbed-financial-success-1236033647/

great armchair reactions from people who didn't read the article, classic.

yeah the comments are even more than usually infuriating

jfc those comments. I'm sure these "enTERtaINMENT iS A buSINesS!" warriors are the same people that pitch a goddamn red-faced fit when Chipotle raises prices 2% on their burritos.

I remember seeing this when it first opened at one of the now-defunct Berkeley theaters.. I was breathlessly scared, but there was a young woman sitting in front of me that was sobbing uncontrollably.. it's hard to overstate what a splash this ambiguous film made in the dawning of the internet age, before most of us even had cellphones; as the article states, it can never be repeated

Yeah, it was definitely an event. A group of us went to see it the first weekend at the campus theater in Champaign, but two of the girls in our group noped out in the lobby and refused to go in to watch it.

Andy's comment triggered this similarly very pre-tech despite living in DotCom1.0-era SF vivid moment...

I remember waiting in line (!) at the Coronet (RIP ~2005) on Geary/Arguello in SF to purchase tickets (no advance sales!) on opening day. JFK Jr. died in his plane crash the day before and that was the cover story in the newspaper which I was reading in line. I had encountered a bit of the film's hype but had avoided any real spoilers. I went with my very goth/artist/wiccan GF at the time lol. She was genuinely spooked but I thought it was more entertaining than terrifying. I'm not sure if I had a phone or a palm pilot... I was relatively slow on that tech until my employer mandated we have them.

a deeply stupid movie for non-horror fans, similar to A Quiet Place

stand in the corner PD

there's a whole bunch of deeply stupid horror movies, but I don't think the original BWP is one of them

unfortunately most of the 'found footage' knockoffs are universally crummy

Filmed in beautiful Frederick County, Maryland, my home of over two decades.

Oh so you were the guy.

I feel lucky that I was taken to this in its opening week, having not heard a thing about it beforehand.

I haven't felt any desire to rewatch it in the last 20 years, but that first viewing certainly worked on me.

Oh I had no idea that was Fredrick

a deeply stupid movie for non-horror fans, similar to A Quiet Place

huge horror fan for about 48 years and strong disagree

my brother and I watched it on vhs in Australia when it came out and somehow weirdly we didn’t know much about it, like the real/fake gambit etc … Anyway, for fun we usually watched scary movies with the lights out, and i will never forget he fully got up halfway through & turned the lights back ON because he was too scared <3
and then when it ended we sat and just stared at each other like omggggg O_O

I rewatched this for the first time with my kids last year, and it scared the bejesus out of them. They had seen a good number of horror classics already, but this one legit freaked them out. I thought it still worked surprisingly well. Tight little movie.

I would have been more into it seeing it on a shitty CRT in the dark all alone, I think. That's how I saw the pre-release SyFy show and that scared me a lot more.

I saw this when I was living in Maroubra in Sydney. I didn't know much about it and it scared the shit out of me. We had to pass some woods on the way home and I legit ran the length of them. I slept with the light on, too.

holds up pretty well. easily avoids the traditional pitfall of found footage, the "why would you be filming this?" moments.

I think the "WTF NOTHING IS HAPPENING" contingent of people were somewhat reacting to the bland state of horror in the 90s, with the waning hours of big-tent 80s IP slashers, films loaded with jump scares and heavily reliant on absurd plot twists, as well as high school horror comedies. genre pieces that were slower burns, where you don't get to outright see the big bad, that relied more on atmosphere and required closer watching weren't mainstream hits.

I sat too close to the screen in the small cinema where I saw this, and was badly affected by motion sickness. Staggered out of the cinema feeling nauseated and looking pale. Had to have a little sit down. People in the queue to go in looked a bit worried.

And then one of my housemates went to see it a few nights later. When we heard him coming home, my boyfriend and I turned off the lights and stood facing into the corners of the sitting room. "What are you doing? Why are you doing that?" he asked, when he turned on the lights. He'd fallen asleep in the cinema and missed the last half hour.

aww he ruined your fun joke! :(

lol sad trombone

lmao at snoring through the blair witch project

i woulda thought it was part of the film

anybody ever been to a film where they mistook the ambient noises from audience members as part of it and had it enhance their viewing?