A Tale of Three Idiots or Why TBWP doesn't work...

Rating: 3/10 (11 August 1999)

...at least for me. [WARNING: POST CONTAINS SPOILERS]
First, to be fair, I thought the three actors (Heather, Josh and Mike playing Heather, Josh and Mike) did well with what they had to work with (i.e. next to nothing); I honestly think they did the best they could. Yeah, they were grating with their constant bitching and cussing and whining, but they had to make up this s**t as they went along (and they only got $1000 bucks each), so I can't really find fault there. I also thought that the film did well in building up suspense... ...unfortunately, that's part of the reason the film doesn't work, because it doesn't pay off. I kept something really terrifying, but the film just didn't deliver. But more on that later...
The first and foremost reason why BWP doesn't work is that three students CONTINUED TO FILM TILL THE END. I mean, this should tip off anyone who might have thought this was real that it was,in fact,not real; at all. It shatters even the illusion of reality, and the characters' attempts to explain their continued filming don't hold water for me. No rational person would film running scared in the night or alleged bits of Josh or while fearing they are lost.
Which brings up the next reason why BWP fails: how could they possibly get lost in the first place? Like they themselves said, the woods aren't that big. They just walk in a straight line and eventually they'll get out. Yet they manage to walk around in circles. Does the film explain this? Not at all. We can only vaguely infer (and it's a long shot) that the "witch" is making them lose directions. But there's never any strong indication of this, unless those stick figures and rock piles are supposed to mean something. Plus they had that compass! Are we supposed to guess that maybe the witch threw their compass off? That seems, to me, to be a heck of a lot to ask from the viewers. So, anyway, the trio come round full circle to find that they've come upon the same log they'd already crossed over a creek(and they sure seem to cross a lot of them in this picture) in their southbound quest to get the heck out of the woods, which is in itself odd since you'd think they'd have recrossed it at some point and had some sense that they'd flipped directions. But the main thing is why not follow that damn creek out of the stupid woods? When Mike in a fit of semi-demented glee confesses he kicked that useless map (previously thought lost) into the creek, he unknowingly provided the clue to another ticket out of there. But, unfortunately, the three students are too unBELIEVABLY stupid to pick up on this (I have to believe that they are monumentally stupid, else I can't buy this at all). But I willingly overlook this in the hopes of some big scary payoff at the end.
Which brings me to the third reason why The Blair Witch Project is nothing more than a house of cards. That payoff never comes. It just doesn't happen. What we get is a shot of Mike in the corner taking a leak, or at least it looks that way. All that expectation I had building up got quickly deflated. What's that about imagination? I'm supposed to use my imagination? Come up with my own vision of the witch? Pfah, any schmoe can do that. Let's see, she's supposed to be this hairy ghost woman whose feet never touch the ground and in the middle of the night, she snags Josh in the middle of the night. Ooohh scary... but... what if it's not a witch. I most certainly did NOT see a witch. Not so much as one nose-wart. Did you see a witch? Then how the heck do you or I know it's a damned witch? What if it's aliens, who stake out the place, to observe the locals and notice three idiots stumbling about in the woods and decide to kidnap them for study or their own amusement. Hey! Maybe it was those aliens who screwed with their compass and made the poor fools lose their way. Stupid? Damn straight! But the filmmakers have left such gaping holes for the audience (the AUDIENCE!) to fill that I or anyone else can come up with some crazy BS to fill in those huge blanks. And no one can tell me I'm wrong because there is nothing to say that's so. NOTHING. If witches, why not aliens? Why not faeries from the magical land of Narnia? Hey, didn't you say to use my imagination? And I could go on, but man would it ever get stupid, but as it stands I'm left unsatisfied with the movie's conclusion.
Some good examples of leaving the imagination to the viewer? How about Jaws. Steven Spielberg knew the power of not showing the shark. We hardly see it, but we know it's there, because we've seen the damage it's done. Or take the Excorcist. Sure we see that a little girl doing all those ghastly things. But we never see the demon that possesses her, but we can only imagine what it would like if we could see it and it would no doubt scare the p**s out of us. Because we have something solid, something strongly visual on which to base our fears. That little packet that Heather found? What the hell was that? Looked like it could have been teeth and possibly a tongue, but it also could have bits of porcelain and a chicken gizzard (and very well could have been). It raises tension, but doesn't truly raise any hairs. It tells me almost nothing. It doesn't stack up against mangled corpses and little girls with heads that spin 360Â° . What you can't see has to be balanced with something you can, and BWP simply doesn't provide enough.
One last word on the theory that what you don't see is scarier that what you do. I'm reminded of a story I read somewhere: Some guy enters a graveyard to rob a grave or something. When he tries to leave, however, he finds something has grabbed his coat. In a superstitious frenzy, thinking the resident of the grave he just robbed has snagged his coat, he struggles to get free, never bothering to turn around. He ultimately dies of fright. Turns out what's snagged his coat is a sword stuck in the ground.
> Sometimes, that noise you hear in the night is some insect or bird, or maybe the wind flapping the shutters,10 or your cat screwing around in the basement. Sometimes what you don't see turns out to be a sword stuck point down in the ground. And sometimes what we do turns out to be some psycho trying to stick that sword between your ribs.
Well, that's it. I've said my piece. You can say I'm talking BS and send me e-mail illustrating the point, but I doubt very much if you can convince me to fear the sham that is The Blair Witch Project.