First let's get a few things straight about this movie. It is partially based on a
true story. The true part is that there was a case of a man who kidnapped eight kids
and killed seven of them, the eigth one having escaped. Everything else is complete
balderdash, made up by the Hollywood spin-doctors to make this movie seem so much more
authentic than it really is.
In spite of this fact, though, The Blair Witch Project is a positively frightening movie.
I'm not going to go into detail about how the movie was made and how the directors did
everything. That would spoil many of the thrills and scares in this movie. One thing which
sets it apart from all other horror flicks out there, though, is the fact that the scares
aren't of the jump-out-and-give-you-a-momentary-scare nature. Rather, they are the kind
which are drawn out and linger with you hours after the movie has ended.
Part of the genius is how the movie is filmed. Three students, as we all know, go out
to make a documentary on the Blair Witch. All the footage we see is filmed by the students
giving the movie a decidely first-person perspective. What this means is that we see exactly
what whoever is holding one of the two cameras sees. There are times when all you get
to see is pitch black accompanied by sound because there isn't enough light for the cameras
to pick up an image. These moments are among some of the most frightening. That's the horror
of this movie: You see exactly what the actors see... and what they don't see.
And, let's face it, oft-times what you don't see can be far scarier than what you do see.
It's a psychological thing, and it lets your imagination conjure up the scariest thing that
can ever exist, something far scarier and blood-chilling than anything a Hollywood special-
effects master could create any day. This movie is designed to scare you the way a camp-fire
story is. You may think that it's completely stupid and not at all scary while it's being
told, but wait until you're in bed with the lights out or walking around the forest or park
at night and you'll find yourself scared witless.
What makes this movie so utterly frightening is the fact that you see only what the students
see, and you hear only what they hear. It leaves everything completely to you imagination,
which can be quite nasty if you've got the kind of imagination that runs away with you. If,
however, you've got the kind of imagination that sticks to rational explanations and needs
visual proof to believe something out of the ordinary, then you probably won't be all that
scared. As well, once you know how the directors choreographed the scares in this movie, they
seem much less real, which is why I'm not going to go into it.
The movie seems real enough, though. Because of the perspective we, as the audience, are given,
everything in this movie feels like it's actually happening. The three students are being
chased through the woods, and because of the perspective and the utter terror we hear in their
voices, it feels real. It's for this reason that people feel that the footage this movie
uses is actual footage of actual students, because of how real and authentic the entire thing
appears.
And authentic it should seem, too. That camera-men were the actors themselves, and they used
camcorders and 30mm film to photograph this movie. It's supposed to be their lost footage,
and it feels like it. The directors and actors did an amazing job on this piece and I highly
recommend it.