Nauseatingly good (spoilers)

Rating: Null/10 (11 May 2003)

I just watched the Blair Witch Project for the first time, and while I didn't think it was the best movie of all time, it was pretty damn good. Hiring three no-name actors to play the parts was a brilliant way to dupe people into thinking this was a true event, and their acting was phenomenal. Not a bit of faked angst or anger. It was all real. Except for the fact that Heather the main character holds onto her camera while trying to kick the crap out of Mike for getting them further lost in the woods. I think she would have put the camera down or something. Oh well.
The movie's scariest point is its Hitchcockian style of not showing you what's out there. Too often in scary movies they try to TELL you what's scary by having a guy in a black cloak with a skewed mask chase after people with a knife. That doesn't do anything for me, he just looks stupid. The real fear is the fear of the unknown. When you cannot SEE what is out there, your imagination runs wild and you imagine the worst. That coupled with the confusing and disturbing final footage of the film crew examining an old abandoned cottage with disturbing findings all over the walls, ending with the cameras falling violently to the ground and uncertainty as to what happened to the film crew, and who it was that was doing all that screaming around them, made this a truly terrifying experience.
To add to the terror I felt, after watching this, I walked upstairs to find all the lights off and the front door open, and nobody there, and I armed myself with a kendo stick for the rest of the night.