The Blair Witch Project

at the Phoenix from 21/10/99

Numerous articles have generated stratospheric hype surrounding The Blair Witch Project, ensuring that its simple, yet intriguing premise is well-known. Three filmmakers disappeared in a Maryland forest in October 1994 while filming a documentary on a local legend, the Blair Witch. The Blair Witch Project is supposedly an extract from their footage recovered a year later.

As student filmmakers Heather Donahue, Joshua Leonard and Michael Williams journey into the heart of darkness, they become increasingly fearful and frustrated as they become lost and more deeply entangled in a grisly mystery. Every moment is captured by relentless first-person camerawork in the combination of black-and-white 16 mm film and High-8 video-recordings.

Limited by an economical budget and meagre resources, co-writers and co-directors Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sanchez have utilised the invigoratingly imaginative conceit of method filmmaking. By having the characters live through the experience of actually making the film themselves without a script, the fascinating boundary between reality and fantasy was blurred. Blair Witch is a resourceful egress from typical horror fare, as it leaves much open to interpretation and the audiences imagination. Unfortunately, it falters as a horror film, as the infrequent scary moments fail to compensate for erratic pacing, repetition and dull spots.

Blair Witch is destined to become a Halloween cult classic that examines psychological disintegration. Although its shoulders cannot bear the full weight of the colossal media hype, there is no detracting from its fascinating originality as an experiment in simulated realism.

Michelle Teo

20/02/2000