If you go down to the woods today...........................

Rating: Null/10 (31 October 1999)

This is one scary movie. It's not a monster or a slasher picture but more of a psychological scare the pants off of you type of horror.
Co-directors Myrick and Sanchez have created terror through everone's fear of the unknown. It has the look and feel of an amateur documentary film and having unknown actors play all of the parts only increases the feeling of authenticity. You are so drawn into the main characters situation that you will believe that this is an actual event that took place.
The film is masterfully crafted. In the early part the main characters are joking around and having fun as they interview the town folk about the legendary Blair witch. Then as they go into the woods, deeper and deeper, they begin to hear things go bump in the night, become lost and slowly begin to unravel. The last few scenes of the picture are as frightening and unpredictable as any I have seen.
Heather Donahue, Michael Williams and Joshua Leonard, playing themselves, are convincing as the three amateur film students. The fact that they seem to be the characters they are playing and are largely unknown actors only heightens the horror.
The jerky motion of the camera gives an authentic feel to an amateur documentary and reportedly left many viewers, including this one, with a feeling of nausea at the film's end.
The Blair Witch Project clearly demonstrates that the modestly budgeted independent film is alive and well. We'll now probably have to endure many big studio clones of this one that are sure to pop up in the next year.
Don't miss this one, it's an original and a one of a kind.