The Blair Witch Project
# 5 Best of Film of 1999
Warning:This film is not for individuals who need to be spoon-fed visual effects to stay interested!
Fear is not being able to explain what we see or hear. The Blair Witch Project works on the same concept: that the unknown, especially when we don't expect it or when we think we are dreaming, is indeed the most frightening. And it succeeds.
Blair Witch Project is about three college students who travel to Burkittsville to shoot a documentary about a witch. They interview a few of the townspeople and obtain non-sensical and rumor-like information about the witch. They hear a disturbing story of a strange hermit who had turned himself in for killing seven children, saying he didn't want to do the witch's bidding anymore. But these contemporary, all-american youth, backpack into the woods to get footage of some of the historical sites anyway. "This is America, we can't get lost." They are never seen again.
One year later, their footage of their journey into the forest is found in the basement of the hermit's abandoned house in the forest. (Yes, the hermit who killed the children.) The film is the footage of their last days--they get lost; run out of food and cigarettes; lose their map; fight; find mysterious things in their path that they cannot explain (piles of rocks and stick-figures hanging from trees); hear truly horrific things at night; and become hunted by someone or something.
Blair Witch is unique film-making. It succeeds by using the most basic elements of film-making to tell the story and scare us (i.e., the use of 8mm and 16mm cameras make the film more realistic and unsettling; filming in the late fall gave an especially haunting and unkind feel to the forest; and, the sounds and voices that wake them in the middle of the night are frightening, even after the movie is over.).
Mike, Josh, and Heather(playing themselves), are the cinematographers. They do a phenomenal job at making the forest its own ominous character--seemingly secure and friendly in its autumn-like appearance (on the surface), but hiding terrible secrets of death in and under its looming branches. They also get past those static high-school ad-libbing characters and create some well-developed characters and scenes in which their lines are truly delightful and/or profound (i.e., Heather's terrifying apology; Mike's witty statement about rednecks not being creative enough to place stick-figures in the trees; and Josh's disturbing interrogation of Heather in which he demands: "Are you going to write us a happy ending?"). If not profound, at least it's independent film-making at its best!
Heather's performance as the director of the documentary is superb, especially her close-up apology to the camera, in which her cold face displays torrents of tears and snot. Moreover, her apology is so personal, captivating, chilling, and sincere, that I felt like a voyeur listening to something not meant for me, and made it hard for me to believe this film was just fictional. I feel this is one of the greatest scenes in film history.
Blair Witch rewrote the marketing plan, being the first film to successfully use one of the most creative and impressive websites of any film I know. It was created by the directors as a way for interested readers to view a complete mythology about the witch and the events that have haunted the town of Blair and Burkittsville. (I suggest you read the mythology, found at www.blairwitch.com, as you will learn more about the witch there than in the movie.)
If you still don't believe me, try this data on for size: Take a grass-roots mocumentary starring three no names, make it into a household name, an urban legend, and a $129 million hit in less than a year by creating an expansive website and documentary about a fictional witch, not the Titanic, but a make-believe witch. To top it all off: get Time Magazine to write a cover-story on you and your film and get your mug-shot on the cover (August 16,1999).
Blair Witch is the antithesis of the Hollywood film. It scares us without any of the typical shock-effects used by the horror genre today. I'm awed by its success and ability to haunt me when I least expect it.
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