Word: witching
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...Pageant. And this time it's personal. The local doyen (Kirstie Alley) is ready to kill, really, to ensure that her daughter Becky (Denise Richards) will win over trailer-park cutie Amber Atkins (Kirsten Dunst). Got all the movie references? Here is a mockumentary (Waiting for Guffman, The Blair Witch Project) about a high school contest (Smile, Election) set among the funny-talking rubes of rural Minnesota (Fargo or every third episode of Mystery Science Theater...
...Blair Witch Project is unique and scary. The premise is original, and the movie taps into many primal fears (of the dark, of being alone, of the unknown) without being cheesy or obvious. But it doesn't quite live up to the buzz around it. When I got out of the 1:45 showing on Thursday afternoon, already all the shows from 7:05 on had sold out. Part of the reason must be that Kendall Square Cinema is the only place in the Boston area that's showing The Blair Witch Project. But I think it's also because...
...Blair Witch Project is designed to keep us from saying that so easily. The premise is that three student filmmakers are making a documentary investigating the ghost stories of a small town. The first screen tells us that we are about to see their footage, recovered a year after their disappearance. The rest of the movie shows the filmmakers at work. The movie is entirely shot in grainy video and 16mm film, often in bad light or with bad sound, through jerky, rushed shots. There's no score and no opening credits. On the one hand, this makes it plausible...
That's not to say that The Blair Witch Project isn't deeply creepy. While most horror movies build to a few terrifying moments, The Blair Witch Project manages to sustain tension for minutes on end. By the end of the movie, even the pastoral daytime scenes are uneasy, and they get shorter and shorter, while the night scenes feel nerve-wrackingly long. Also, the scary things in most horror movies are outlandish and laughable even as they scare us. Scream makes a virtue of this, as it winks at every silly clich of the genre. This movie terrifies, however...
...Blair Witch Project is unique and scary. The premise is original, and the movie taps into many primal fears (of the dark, of being alone, of the unknown) without being cheesy or obvious. But I don't think it quite lives up to the buzz around it. When I got out of the 1:45 showing on Thursday afternoon, already all the shows from 7:05 on had sold out. Part of the reason must be that Kendall Square Cinema is the only place in the Boston area that's showing The Blair Witch Project. But I think...