Nearly fifteen years ago I was sitting in a friend's living room watching the Blair Witch Project. There were ten of us crowded around his big screen tv (his family had the only one that any of us knew of) and the crowd was pretty evenly mixed between the girls and boys. It was supposed to be a scary movie so that crowd should have been a winning combo - except it wasn't. See as the movie starts I'm sitting in between my buddy Phil and this pretty blonde who believes that touching hands is the start down the slippery slope of eternal damnation.
The movie starts and we're greeted with that bullshit introduction proclaiming that this is a "true story." Now at the time we weren't inundated with the concept of false documentaries so this was a major linchpin in building the fear. So the movie is going along and they're in the woods with their gps and trying to find the right direction to go. At this point everything is still in the buildup and we're starting to see those creepy little hanging stick men.
Then one of the boys, I can't remember which, looks right at the sun and says, "We need to go North." And so saying he walks right towards the sun. That was the moment that broke the film for me.
Now I completely understand that there are some people in this world who don't know that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west - hell lots of people flip those two all the time. But there are only two possible answers when looking at the sun for which direction you're heading and north isn't one of them! From that moment on every inconsistency (and there are a lot) popped out like a sore thumb and the movie was about as terrifying as petting a puppy.
I haven't thought about this movie in years.
ReplyDeleteAll I remember about that movie is the girl (?) crying into the camera, and then the last shot of somebody standing facing a wall in a basement somewhere. The rest is just a blurr of shaky camera shots along with a general feeling that I've wasted my time.
Did you watch it again recently?
No, there are a bunch of articles popping up in my feed about it being the fifteenth anniversary of the monumental Blair Witch Project. All of them glowing with praise I might add.
DeleteFucking awful movie.
The movie is not about the supernatural; it is about stupidity.
ReplyDeleteThey pack a map, and one of them throws it away.
They pack a survival guide, and none of them ever references it.
They find a stream, and rather than following it, they cross it over and over again.
Anyone could get lost and die in the woods if they are this stupid.
"Anyone should get lost and die in the woods if they are this stupid."
DeleteFixed that for ya. ;)
Winning the internet Mr. Doolan?
DeleteI remember that scene,as well, and to me it was an 'ah-ha' moment. After every encounter with the weird (stick figures, sounds in the night, etc.) the characters acted more and more confused and even more and more child-like. When I saw that scene my thought was 'they're bewitched'; they were being magically confused.
ReplyDeleteJust my take.
I sometimes wish that I could have taken that mindset with the film and enjoyed it even a little bit. Instead I just got pissed because they violated practically every survival rule I could think of and then pissed on the few that they imagined they were following.
DeleteRick I think that's way too deep a notion for this film. I saw in in the theater when it first came out and it was okay, I saw it a year or two later on t.v. and thought...WTF? It did not hold up to a second viewing on the small screen
ReplyDeleteMy biggest regret about this film is the 10,000 "found footage" films that have come out since. I was taking video production courses at 11-13 and as a middle-school kid I could hold the camera steady and focus better than folks can in most of these films.
God, the whole "found footage" genre needs to die a slow death that involves lots of fire and naked dancing celebrations. Oh, and bees for the dancers. Need to make sure everyone suffers here . . .
DeleteNow THAT'S a party!
DeleteThis is what I'm say!
DeleteIn my family if you went camping, hiking, backpacking or even driving more than 100 miles from home, you brought a gun. I'm not talking automatic weapons with 500 rounds or any nonsense like that. I mean hunting rifle, shotgun or pistol. That way if you ran across a bear, mountain lion, rattler or murderous psycho you had a decent chance. first time I saw Blair witch I laughed my ass off at the stupidity of going out there unprepared.
ReplyDeleteExactly!
Delete