The Blair Witch Project

September 11, 1999

Scariest film I have ever seen…even scarier than Showgirls.

No one gets impaled, no one gets decapitated, there isn’t even any blood (okay, there’s the tiniest, tiniest bit). But let me tell you, sticks and stones can do a lot more than break your bones…they can scare the ever living shit out of me and all my friends. I wanted to sleep with the lights on after seeing it. My best friend’s boyfriend insisted on keeping a loaded gun under the bed the night they saw it, not to mention barricading the bedroom door. And apparently, most of the nation has felt the same way. What is it about The Blair Witch Project that has scared the shit out of America? I believe it can be condensed into one line from the film, “This is America. It is impossible to be lost for very long in America.” Is it? Maybe and that’s enough.

Yes, I knew that it’s not real when I went to see it. I realize that a lot of dumbasses did not. Doesn’t matter. Still scary as shit. The PR blitz that surrounded this film was far more clever than any Taco Bell cup topper or MTV music video. A Sci-Fi channel ‘mockumentary,’ a cool web site and a kick ass soundtrack didn’t do jackshit. Word of mouth is solely responsible for the success of the Blair Witch. And with a good film, that’s all you need.