Well I just saw this movie today for the first time. What a total piece of crap movie “Blair Witch” is. Just awful. One of the worst movies I have ever seen, ever, and that is no exaggeration. Not scary even for a microsecond, and the 3 main characters are unsympathetic and thoroughly unlikeable. Everything about this movie sucks. The worst part is that we are going to see a flood of copycats starting next summer.
After it was over I walked straight out and immediately asked to see the manager, and then asked for my $4 back (he obliged, though I had to fill out a form).
Never in my life have I done this before, so that was a new experience for me … maybe some congratulations are in order after all.
If you haven’t seen it I am begging you: please, please do not waste your valuable time on this suckapalooza.
Okay, time for a dumb-ass question:
In one of the commercials for the movie, it showed a sherrif holding a cannister of film. I assumed that the scene would be in the movie. It wasn’t. Also a scene where they ask one of the guy’s fathers “Do you think your son’s death was caused by the supernatural?”
All I saw was the footage shot by the crew. Did I miss something?
No, Lissa, those scenes weren’t in the movie, don’t worry, you didn’t blank out.
From what I gathered from the Time article about the movie, the original conception of the movie they were going to break in and out of the camping scenes with interviews with the police, and locals and all that kind of thing, as if it were a real documentary. But, after seeing how much camping footage they had, they decided to go with that.
RTA, I have to disagree, I disliked the movie as well, but when people ask me, I tell them they have to experience it for themselves. The opinions for it have been so wildly varying I don’t pretend to know that other people will hate it, considering how terror-striken some people have been, I don’t feel justified telling people to wait for video, because I know any scary effects would be lost watching it in a well lit living room.
Diane:
I don’t really watch Ally McBeal. So, I missed that, but I didn’t even remember him from Forrest Gump, someone had to tell me he played Forrest’s son. How neat!
Another neat thing from Sixth Sense. Did you even realize the kid in the beginning was Don Wahlberg formerly of the New Kids on The Block? He was looking so skinny, I didn’t even recognize him, it wasn’t til later that I realized it was him, only because I remembered his name from the credits, and couldn’t think of who else he could be.
pat
I didn’t realize he was Forrest Gumps kid. I’ll have to check it out on my video. I love Ally McBeal (ducking flames) and one of my favorite episodes featured this kid. He sued God for giving him leukemia. I think he is an amazing little actor.
I saw Donny Wahlberg’s name on the credit, but a day or two after the movie I realized that I didn’t see him in the film. Now that you mention the kid in the bathroom, you’re right, but DAAAAAAAAAMN! They sure made him look like crap.
RTA - One word: AMEN!
>^,^<
KITTEN
Coarse and violent nudity. Occasional language.
My god, Diane,
You just keep taking dig and taking digs and taking digs.
It seems you’re just trying to be inflammatory now. I’m still RELATIVELY new but isn’t that what trolling is all about?
Next on Springer:
"People who take laymen movie reviews a tad too personal".
Good God, Topo, it’s only a freakin movie. Unless you wrote, directed, or starred in this film, don’t sweat over that fact that I thought it was crap, really, it’s nothing personal against you.
Sheesh!
P.S. Con #3 must have taught you the definition of “troll”. I will continue to offer my opinion to new posts if I feel the urge.
RTA - One word again: AMEN
>^,^<
KITTEN
Coarse and violent nudity. Occasional language.
Oh my gosh, I just read a snippet about Donny Wahlberg, it says he liked that part so much that he lost 30 pounds so he could play it!!! Wow, 30 pounds! thats crazy. He certainly looked it!
One time I was talking to a guy about the movie Unforgiven, he told me he thought it was one of the worst movies ever made. I went on for about 15 minutes, trying to convince him of all the reasons it was great. He went on the same amount of time trying to convince me why it sucked. After this conversation, where I told him he didn’t understand it, and he told me I bought into the hype. I had a realization just when I was about to keep going on… We were both being stupid, and opinions are something everyone has, and to get defensive about your opinion is silly, because there is no right or wrong, just different takes on the same thing.
Oh well. I think that relates.
patThat’s my point. It IS only a movie. So why do you feel the need to just keep coming in here and being insulting. I don’t care what the topic is. We could be talking about chocolate covered orange candies. If you just kept coming in going “Yuck!”, “Blech!”, “I’m going to vomit” I’d still think you were being rude. If you started a thread on NBK, I wouldn’t keep posting on there talking about what a collosal piece of garbage it is. I might say it once but after that I just wouldn’t say anything.
I just think you’re trying to be inflammatory. Being that way in any thread, to me, is rude. If you did this in any other thread, I’d say the same thing.
BTW, because this really doesn’t belong here, I was going to just email you. Heh…good luck to me!
No - see here is the difference.
I made my original comment/movie review/what have you.
Others made their own comment, good, bad, or indifferent.
I guess all the “Hip hip hurrays” for this movie are okay with you because you agree, but let someone voice their distaste for this piece of garbage and you fall apart.
If I feel the urge to comment on their comments whether I agree or disagree, I will, and I will continue to do so. I agreed with RTA’s post so I “amen’d” it. Big freakin deal!
You’ve really got to stop taking this so personal, seriously.
About Donny, he really must have wanted this part to go through the weightloss thing. He was on screen what, 10 minutes? Dang!
>^,^<
KITTEN
Coarse and violent nudity. Occasional language.
To get back to BTW… I didn’t feel it was scary. I felt it took creepiness/eeriness to a whole new level, but “scary” is not the word I’d use. It’s hard to find a movie to compare it to… if you’re one of the 40 people in the world who saw Pi, that’s a useful comparison. Creepy, weird, inexplicable, but not scary.
Warning: The following commentary contains plot spoilers. Not that you don’t already know the plot if you’ve read this far in the thread.
I’m a bit confused as to the plot of the movie. In the shots of the townspeople talking about the Blair Witch, one of them refers to “Mr. Potter,” the old crackpot who came down to the town from the woods to announce that he was finally finished (with something). But he can’t be the Blair Witch, since the witch is definitely characterized as female. Was he constructing the Blair Witch, like some sort of Dr. Frankenstein? Is that what he finished? The two are certainly connected. Most of the plot incontinuities can be explained away as “witchcraft,” an explanation which I would consider valid, but I cannot use witchcraft to explain how Mr. Potter is related to the Blair Witch. Any suggestions?
Wordsmith: One of the elite few who knows that George Herbert Walker Bush was a Huge Berserk Rebel Warthog.
I think Pi is a good movie to compare to the Blair Witch Project.
Pi, actually creeped me out in scenes, it had a very disturbing feel to it.
Pi had a really cool interesting story as well.
Thats the thing, the Blair Witch story was nonexistent, kind of there, but not really. Pi had a terriffic story, and it was disturbing, and it was made for next to nothing.
The kind of feeling I had coming out of Pi, was what I was expecting from Blair Witch, its just not what I got.
pat
Re Mr. Potter and the witch:
I wondered about that too, but I chalk it up to two things: a) the all encompassing nature of evil, witchcraft, etc. The witch could have been controlling, directing, or possessing Mr. Potter and that’s why he killed the kids. So there is a Mr. Potter and a witch but they were both involved in the earlier killings.
or b) the fact that this was all local legend, which is notoriously imprecise and sometimes flat out wrong. Even if there “really” was a witch in the woods, the locals might know the witch story, and they might know some other story about some creepy kid killer, and sometimes they get them all mixed up.
And by the way, I thought that when he came to announce that he was all finished, he meant he was finished killing the kids.
– Greg, Atlanta
Mr. Potter was announcing that he was finished killing the kids. I don’t think it was ever explained why precisely seven and then done. I think Mr. Potter was possessed by the witch into doing the killings. Again, it isn’t explained why the witch had him stop.
Personally, like some others, I believe that it is Miss Brown (Holly or Maggy … can’t remember now, I just remember her last name was Brown) is the current incarnation of the witch.
It wasn’t Potter, it was Rustin Parr. According to the backstory, Parr had killed seven kids back in the forties because this “lady” had told him to. The way that it is explained that he did it sets you up for the end. He took them into the basement by twos and killed one while the other faced the wall. This is why we see Mike facing the wall when Heather runs downstairs. Since we’re told that the witch supposedly made Parr do it, it also suggests the possibility that Josh was the actual killer of Heather and Mike.
Saint Eutychus
www.disneyshorts.org
Thank you Diane for your kind words but don’t get into a fight on my account. And I feel the need to again say that “Blair Witch” is a total piece of crap. It really is, you know. Honest.
And I have also been witness to the phenomenon of people who, after investing a lot of emotional energy in believing that this movie is great, or borderline true, or really scary, become extremely defensive - abnormally so, I think - when told that their new favorite movie of all time is pathetic and shoddy and should have never made it out of a classroom (where it should have received maybe a C, at best, for effort).
I wouldn’t compare that tripe to Pi. I’d compare it more to War of the Worlds … people having panic attacks over what’s essentially a cheap hoax. In other words, mass hysteria (or was that mass hypnosis?) … I predict that in 20 years nobody will 'fess to having bought the “Blair Witch” drivel hook line & sinker.
Hey bernard . . . it’s Mary Brown.
Hmmm … now that is interesting. Josh as the possessed killer. That is something I hadn’t thought of.
Now, there have been numerous stories about how the incredible marketing for the Blair Witch Project is going to change how movies are marketed. Now, according to a Salon Magazine article alot of the online good reviews were actually started by the film’s creators and friends. Ok, that doesn’t bode well for the future of film marketing, if the studios are going to send good reviews, anonomously, to film review sites, and start “amatuerish” web sites talking about the film before its even out. As it is, I avoid film web sites like the plague, but this will just make it worse.
Ok, Blair Witch Project marketing was incredibly good. But, why does Hollywood insist on trying to copy ideas? Especially, ideas like this- I mean, Blair Witch Project is a special case, Do you think a slick Hollywood movie being marketed like this will work quite as well?
I don’t.
Anyway.
Here is that salon magazine site, if you are interested.
http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/1999/07/16/blair_marketing/index.html
pat
I just saw BWP tonight and I was impressed. I can see however how some people wouldn’t like it (Diane, no need to post another message saying you thought it was a bad movie). It essentially had no story and some people want a narrative line.
The other thing is how well you can relate to the characters’s situation. I, and I suppose many other people, have at some time been in a situation where you were scared for no apparent reason. Half-seen sights and half-heard sounds suddenly acquire sinister meanings. The sound of a snapping branch or a dog howling in the distance can become the scariest thing you’ve ever heard. This movie played on those remembered fears.
And the final scene of Mike standing quietly in the corner was as scary as anything I’ve ever seen in a movie.
Did anyone catch SportsCenter tonight on ESPN? They had a piece called “The Which Bears Project” about two sportscasters going into the woods in search of the elusive player that the Chicago Bears would need to complete their lineup. Highlights: “Do you know who we’re looking for?” “Of course! I have the media guide! Oh my God – Where is it?” “Hahaha! I threw it in the creek!” Scattered pictures of Jim MacMahon amid artfully wrapped twigs. “Are you getting this? Are we rolling? Ok, now we’re going…no…we’re still rolling.” And of course how can I forget the interviews with the townspeople. “What did that guy mean? ‘Watch out for the real bears?’”