The 'fans' of Blair Witch, who made the original so successful have, by
all accounts, given the follow-up a fair mauling.
A little unfairly I would say, as the film is quite entertaining and whilst it
uses the original film as little more than a means to promote itself, it has an
originality and theme which is holds up on its own.
It may be bollocks in part, but its good bollocks.
The story is set in the aftermath of The Blair Witch Project film
release, as hundreds of Witch fans descend upon Burkettsville to see
where the film was made and go witch-finding themselves.
The opening is in many ways a parody of the original, craftily presenting itself
as a documentary on this phenomena whilst pointing out that The Blair Witch
Project was a fabrication ... or was it ?
Very tongue in cheek, and quite amusingly done. There were many references to
the original film, some of them extremely subtle, others quite cliqué;
the batteries in the fridge were very good. Missed the joke ? Never mind.
The main feature of the original - hand-held footage - is still used to great
effect, although less is used as more traditional film techniques take hold.
Video footage is still the lynch-pin around which this film revolves.
As a group of intrepid witch-finders camp out under the stars, they discover
they have lost five hours of their lives, their camp has been smashed up and
their video equipment destroyed.
Luckily they locate the tapes, head off to safety and try and find out what
happened in those missing hours.
Cue lots of weird and wonderful happenings. Including a tape which when run
forwards shows nothing but the occasional ghostly image, but played backwards,
well, there's suddenly five hours of key footage. Amazing.
Far from having reached safety, our gang have fallen prey to mass hallucination,
delusion, or perhaps the influence of Blair Witch herself.
It's all well done, if a little confusing at time, and we are left hanging on
the, "Did they do it ?", closure, and credits packed full of songs to pad out
the album release.
Although there's little that is really horrific about the film, there are a lot
of images of violence shown in the cut-aways and the psychological imagery
holds together well. The, "Hah ! That made you jump", gags are well delivered,
with immaculate timing.
Some of the acting was a little wooden in places, the story contrived in others,
but in contrast, lots of the, "What the f--k's going on ?", interactions worked
really well.
Given the phenomenal success of The Blair Witch Project, it was
inevitable that something would come along as a sequel; whilst this is hardly a
part two, it uses the original as a good vehicle to ride on.
There are reports that Blair Witch 3 is already in the pipe-line,
covering the events prior to the original; just as well, as I don't think
they'd have been able to sustain the momentum for Blair Witch 3 :
Free the Black Hills Three.
