The Blair Witch Project (1999)

If you want my advice, wait for an off night and go see this as late as possible. I saw it with a full crowd all excited by the rumors they heard. This was not the way to enjoy this movie. Let me start off with a little rant. I've become more and more annoyed with the general behavior of movie audiences lately. I sat through Election with a baby, a woman who felt the need to talk to the screen, and a couple of people who laughed hysterically at everything no matter how un-humorous. I sat through The Haunting with a couple who talked through the entire movie. I missed large sections of American Pie due to teenagers hooting and hollering for no particular reason. Are you seeing a trend yet? If you're going to talk or make enough noise to annoy others, don't go to the movies. Or just try and show a hint of maturity and civilization by being quiet. I didn't pay $7 to listen to you talk and neither did anyone else. Through out The Blair Witch Project there was a group sitting behind us that laughed incessantly. Apparently, people yelling at each other and saying the word fuck is the funniest thing they have ever heard. I now return you to your regularly scheduled review.

The movie is shot entirely on video tape and 16mm film. This means you get an unusual TV like square image on screen. It starts with the film crew gathering together to make a documentary about a Maryland legend of the Blair witch. The footage shows everything the crew does, from picking each other up, to shopping for suppllies, to driving. They eventually hit town and start interviewing people. They then head into the woods to get footage of some of the areas where horrors were supposed to have occurred.

The footage is extremely shaky most of the time. Don't sit up front, you could literally suffer from motion sickness. But this shaky footage and the fact that they shoot everything they do creates an unusually strong feeling of reality. At no point do I think to myself that these people are acting. You really feel like you are watching lost footage of their actual trip. For the most part this is because that is exactly how it was shot. The actors were taught how to operate the cameras and then sent into the woods with only a few pointers on what to do. The actors even use their own names.

The trip starts to go wrong as they get lost and then lose their map. At night they hear strange noises all around them. Somebody piles rocks outside their tents at night. Strange little stick figures appear everywhere. The movie starts light hearted and even humorous. Eventually it becomes nervous and uncomfortable. And then it gets creepy. The crew becomes completely unhinged by their situation. By the time the movie ends, I was barely breathing. My throat was tight from what unfolds on the screen.

This movie succeeds because of something that Hollywood has forgotten. What you can't see can be a lot more frightening than what you can see. The Blair Witch Project is all about what you can't see. Special effects are non-existent. The dark, some sounds in the night and the actors obvious terror is all there is. It builds slowly through the movie as the hopelessness of the situation becomes more and more apparent.

Apparently they actually shot upwards of 6 hours of usable footage for the movie. About an hour and a half of that makes up the movie. I would have liked to see more. My only real complaint is that by the time it becomes truly scary, it's almost over. I would have loved to have that part extended for maybe another half hour. I don't object to the slow build up that takes most of the movie. That's what makes it truly effective. The complaint is that the ending is so effective that I would have liked it drawn out more. If rumor is true and the DVD release of this contains that 4-6 hours of footage, I will anxiously await its release. Then I could watch the whole thing unfold in the middle of the night, without a horde of cackling youngsters behind me.

- John Shea