The found footage sub-genre of horror was said to have been started by the 1980 Italian feature Cannibal Holocaust, where it was used to satirize Italian media coverage of terrorist groups during the "Years of Lead". In 1998, The Last Broadcast, an American film, used the format to tell the story of the Jersey Devil. In 1993, Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez, students at the University of Central Florida, had the idea of a fictional documentary on a mysterious paranormal phenomenon, based on their shared opinion that paranormal documentaries were scarier than traditional horror films. They decided to combine more traditional horror tropes from films like The Shining and Alien with documentaries like the series In Search of...(narrated by Leonard Nimoy, incidentally) and, probably the biggest influence, Charles Pierce's 1972 docudrama The Legend of Boggy Creek (about the Fouke monster, a bigfoot like creature in Arkansas). They formed Haxan films to produce it, and spend years refining the concept, using multiple influences, including mystics like Rasputin and Edward Kelly, the Salem Witch Trials, and Arthur Miller's The Crucible. Leads Heather Donahue, Michael C. Williams, and Joshua Leonard were hired through auditions in the Musical Theater Works in New York. Eventually, the film would begin principal photography in Maryland, which lasted 8 days until Halloween, 1997. The actors were unaware that the mythology of the Blair Witch was entirely fabricated by the directors, or that the townspeople they interviewed were planted. They also improvised, due to unexpected events the directors threw in. Over twenty hours of footage was shot, which was cut down to 2 and a half hour film, which was screened at the Sundance Film Festival. Hoping at least for a television run, the directors were likely surprised when Artisan Entertainment (known for films like Reservoir Dogs and Bad Lieutenant) purchased the film for $1.1 million. Sure enough, the film, with a budget of only $60,000, grossed $284 million at the box office. The fictional mythology and footage of the film was trumpeted as real during publicity, which is credited as helping the film. The film spawned off two sequels and a larger media franchise.
The film starts with a disclaimer that the footage we are about to see was recovered from the woods after the mysterious disappearance of Heather Donahue, Michael Williams, and Joshua Leonard in the Maryland woods. Said footage shows them interviewing various citizens of the town of Blair, Maryland about a local legend called "The Blair Witch". They hear of 1940's child murderer Rustin Parr, and of a woman in the 1800's, Robin Weaver, who saw an old woman floating when she was lost in the woods. The documentarians head into the woods in search of the legend, but gradually become lost due to Mike throwing the map in the creek. As tensions rise between the three, they find a number of strange occurrances have been happening. Starting as twig snaps in the night, they escalate as the three travel through the woods.
Martin Scorsese once observed that "cinema is a matter of what is in the frame and what's out [of the frame]". I think this film is the most apparent example of that within the horror genre. A lot of the actual scares are mostly off-camera. The characters clearly see it, and react to it viscerally, but we the audience don't see it ourselves. This actually intensifies the scares, since we aren't sure what is chasing them. Sometimes, it works to great effect to reveal things, such as one evocative scare towards the end where a bundle of sticks reveals the remains of one of the leads, or the final scene. It is more effective than I thought, especially with the lack of music and the subtlety of it. Similarly, the realism really works, with the characters acting as people might act in this scenario. I did like the early scenes with the weird sub-documentary look to it. It really makes it seem like a real thing.
The main problem with the film is that it lulls towards the middle, with the characters largely screaming at each other and walking in the woods. This really doesn't add much, and admittedly, a lot of this review was written while that part was happening, because I felt nothing of note was going on. It is also fairly short. I know that there is a longer cut somewhere, and maybe that has more scares and mythology, but I would rather not watch a film of just walking for 2 hours.
I enjoyed this more than I thought I would. It was effective, it never actually showed what was haunting the people (unlike other films of this particular genre), and it has a surprising sense of folklore and mythology. Plus, it just feels like a real documentary. So, this is a recommendation, though bare in mind it is very boring towards the middle.
Tomorrow, I deal with the Spanish film Spirit of the Beehive.
The film starts with a disclaimer that the footage we are about to see was recovered from the woods after the mysterious disappearance of Heather Donahue, Michael Williams, and Joshua Leonard in the Maryland woods. Said footage shows them interviewing various citizens of the town of Blair, Maryland about a local legend called "The Blair Witch". They hear of 1940's child murderer Rustin Parr, and of a woman in the 1800's, Robin Weaver, who saw an old woman floating when she was lost in the woods. The documentarians head into the woods in search of the legend, but gradually become lost due to Mike throwing the map in the creek. As tensions rise between the three, they find a number of strange occurrances have been happening. Starting as twig snaps in the night, they escalate as the three travel through the woods.
Martin Scorsese once observed that "cinema is a matter of what is in the frame and what's out [of the frame]". I think this film is the most apparent example of that within the horror genre. A lot of the actual scares are mostly off-camera. The characters clearly see it, and react to it viscerally, but we the audience don't see it ourselves. This actually intensifies the scares, since we aren't sure what is chasing them. Sometimes, it works to great effect to reveal things, such as one evocative scare towards the end where a bundle of sticks reveals the remains of one of the leads, or the final scene. It is more effective than I thought, especially with the lack of music and the subtlety of it. Similarly, the realism really works, with the characters acting as people might act in this scenario. I did like the early scenes with the weird sub-documentary look to it. It really makes it seem like a real thing.
The main problem with the film is that it lulls towards the middle, with the characters largely screaming at each other and walking in the woods. This really doesn't add much, and admittedly, a lot of this review was written while that part was happening, because I felt nothing of note was going on. It is also fairly short. I know that there is a longer cut somewhere, and maybe that has more scares and mythology, but I would rather not watch a film of just walking for 2 hours.
I enjoyed this more than I thought I would. It was effective, it never actually showed what was haunting the people (unlike other films of this particular genre), and it has a surprising sense of folklore and mythology. Plus, it just feels like a real documentary. So, this is a recommendation, though bare in mind it is very boring towards the middle.
Tomorrow, I deal with the Spanish film Spirit of the Beehive.
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