The mean which that turned capitalist!

Rating: 8/10 (25 May 2005)

"The Blair Witch Project" may be considered a great revival for the supernatural pranks we have all participated in during our teenage years. Being interested in the unknown is something natural for those who had their imagination stimulated year after year by "The Twilight Zone" during the 50's and 60's, by "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" and "Unsolved Mysteries" in the 80's, or by "The X Files" more recently. Each time had its monsters and presented them as it suited their audiences: scientists experimenting without any conscience, aliens taking over the Earth, mutants resulting from genetic engineering programs or simply the dark side of human beings.
The idea of creating a legend, making a movie, and having fun at the same time may have been ingeniously conceived by directors Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sanchez, who probably couldn't anticipate how profitable their project would be. However, the movie was produced with extreme perfectionism, from casting to experimental screenings to test the public's reaction, besides their innovative filming methods.
Using two cameras  a 16mm and another one for "homemade" videos  Myrick and Sanchez depicted the escalating fear manifested by Heather, Mike, and Josh, the three characters who are lost in the middle of a forest while trying to collect enough evidence to prove that the witch does exist. In order to obtain total realism from these amateur actors, the directors limited themselves to direct from a distance, handing them a draft for the script with a list of scenes that were going to be filmed during the day along with some food and a map that would give them a clue to where their next meeting would take place. The directors' objective was revolutionize the Hollywoodian way of making scary movies, refusing to give away when those typical scary moments would come and when the audience should scream. That was why the actors, while really exploring their field, were constantly scared by their directors' pranks.
Another differential was not showing the characters on a daily routine. Sex scenes? No way! Who would feel romantic about being lost in the middle of the woods? There's only place for exhaustion, frustration, and total shock  what led audiences to believe that they were watching a real documentary. The only thing that seems to have been surgically analyzed is the psychological pressure the movie would put their audience under.
The great marketing force behind the "Blair Witch" must be attributed to the company that was responsible for the distribution. After considering how critics and other entertainment authorities rejected the movie at the Sundance Festival  which was the first time it was presented in its final format after all the experimental screenings  Artisan decided to heavily invest in the box office. The core of their marketing strategy was the movie's website, which was updated on a weekly basis and affirmed that it was all a true story: three young people from Maryland had disappeared indeed. Several "news articles" would back up the fact that the witch is the ghost of a woman who had been burned to death during the Inquisition, besides quoting witnesses to a mass murder from the 40's when a man killed seven kids after being told by the witch's ghost to do so. This was such a fool-proof plan that the website even presented statements from the missing kids' families and day by day more tapes were being found by the students' friends in the woods.
Actually, this mockery is not talked about at all. How far can studios lie to get a blockbuster? Well, we should say that lying is out of question, but in these days when everybody has to gamble in order to profit, this may have been one of the most brilliant ideas in a long time. Besides, it's stupid to think a website could have attracted so many followers, right? Or may not