THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT (1999)

Cast

Plot

First-time writer -directors Myrick and Sanchez give a bunch of film students a camera and send them off into the Maryland woods to make a documentary about the legend surrounding a local witch. It all sounds pretty boring, but when they genuinely get lost, things start to become a little more interesting. In fact, it rather plays into the hands of the real filmmakers who are following the unsuspecting students around the woods trying to scare the living shit out of them. During their three-day ordeal, the students, under the leadership of bull-headed Heather, have kept a constant video diary. The final 87-minute film was edited down from nearly twenty hours of footage. The final cut shows the three students stomping around the woods crying and screaming at each other as the tension begins to get to them. What makes this even more engrossing is the realisation that much of this terror is genuine. 'The Blair Witch' is a raw visceral film that explores the effects of stress on the human psyche - watched on this level it is certain to please. It is not, however, a horror film that, if the hype is to believed, will have us all wetting our beds. If you are expecting a classic horror, you may be slightly disappointed.