Sunday Bloody Sunday Matinee: The Blair Witch Project (20th Anniversary) [Film]

Welcome to Day 15 of Trainwreck’d Society’s Annual Month of Horror Showcase! We have a fully loaded month of all things horror for you fine folks! October is our favorite month for this very reason, and we are so excited to share 31 full days of film showcases and interviews with some of the finest folks from the world of horror, just as we have been doing for the last 6 years. What started as a simple 5 day showcase, has now blossomed into a full blown month long event. You’re going to love this! Enjoy!

“Soon after its release, The Blair Witch Project became a worldwide sensation and a film school conversation piece, now relegated to the same exclusive space as Psycho, The Exorcist, The Omen, The Shining, Halloween, etc. It was reported by USA Today to be the first film to go “viral” As for being a movie biz phenomenon, the film broke records– while its budget was a scant $60,000, TBWP actually grossed a staggering $250MM worldwide, making it one of the most successful independent films of all time.” – Tell All Your Friends PR

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Folks, it pains me to realize that The Blair Witch Project is now celebrating its 20th year of existence. It’s something that is REALLY aging me. The experience I had when this film came out was so damn peculiar. I will be the first to admit that I was successfully duped by the marketing campaign that led the world to believe that this “found footage” was absolutely real. I did, and anybody who says they didn’t buy is full of shit. I honestly can’t remember when or how I learned that it actually wasn’t real. It was that damn convincing.

The Blair Witch is the proverbial grandfather of found footage horror, and as TAYF told us in the intro, it deserves to be considered one of the greatest horror films of all time. It almost pains me that an experience like this film coming out can not happen again. Sometimes I do feel nostalgic for those pre-Internet runs everything times to feel those emotions again. But, then I remember what one of the the film’s directors, Daniel Myrick, actually said 3 years ago on this very site when I proclaimed it wasn’t possible for The Blair Witch to happen again. He had this to say:

“I think anything is possible. Blair Witch came along when everyone was getting pretty set in their ways in the horror genre, so it shook things up in a big way. No reason why it couldn’t happen again. And yes, it was (and is surreal) being that Blair was always a ‘small’ movie, by design. We never expected it to become so huge.” (Trainwreck’d Society, October 31st, 2016)

So maybe I’m wrong? I wouldn’t mind being wrong in this scenario. But the main point her his that The Blair Witch is a wonderfully made horror film and one of the greatest of all time.  It was a damn fine film then, and 20 years later it most definitely holds up. Even as popular horror started to move more into an emphasis on gore and jump scares, this film has held its ground as more than just a phenomenon of the moment. For our younger readers out there who haven’t gotten around to this classic, I heavily implore that you do so right away!

And one final point I feel needs to be made: WE KNEW THE ENDING!! The entire time, we knew what was going to happen, and it still shocked the hell out of us! Really think about that, and tell me it’s not an incredible film.

So here’s to another 20 years of appreciating one of the finest horror films of all time!