‘The Blair Witch Project’ Was A Moment That Can’t Be Replicated

I remember the first time I heard of The Blair Witch Project. Today, it’s a film with legendary status among horror fans (and, possibly even more so among marketers). It was a film veiled in mystery. But in 1999, the internet was still in its early days. The concept of “spoilers” wasn’t really a big “thing” yet. You could actually go to a movie without knowing everything about it. 

And that was the experience of a friend of mine, who saw an early screening. He was a horror film fan and – to my surprise – actually seemed kind of unnerved by this film. I asked him a few questions about and he said, “Just go see it.” He seemed like he just didn't want to continue talking about it.

I remember seeing a poster for the film with a close-up of a girl’s eyes: she looked cold, tired and scared. It wasn’t the over-the-top expressions we normally see on the faces of victims in horror films. There was a sadness there. Her eyes conveyed real dread; it was as if she had accepted that something terrible was going to happen. Also - notably - her face wasn’t recognizable. This wasn’t a movie or TV star. The tagline on the poster, right above her face, said, “In October of 1994, three student filmmakers disappeared in the woods near Burkittsville, Maryland while shooting a documentary… A year later, their footage was found.” You were forced to wonder: “Is this real?” 

Yes, it seems naive today, but lots of people believed that The Blair Witch Project was a documentary film pieced together from footage shot by three student filmmakers: Heather, Mike, and Josh. They were played by Heather Donahue (who is now known as Rei Hance), Michael C. Williams, and Joshua Leonard. They used their real names, adding to the blurring between reality and fiction. And, of course, none of them were famous yet. You couldn't "Google" them; Google wasn't a verb yet. Then, as now, movies were often marketed on the starpower of the cast; most films have at least someone you’ve heard of. 

On top of that, the actors apparently kept a low profile during the promotion of the film. Again, this was in the early days of the web: you couldn’t just look things up the way you can now. There was no social media. Today, there’s so much information available at your fingertips; that wasn’t the case in ‘99. But even back then, movie fans could go to the then-new Internet Movie Database to look up information about a film. And IMDb listed the three actors as “missing, presumed dead.” Today, you could fairly easily investigate if those actors actually were missing or dead. But back then, you couldn’t. 

There were other things that, by design, led the masses to believe that this was a “real” story. These days, nearly every movie has a website and social media accounts. That wasn’t the case back then. But the official Blair Witch website (which now redirects to Lionsgate’s official site) went live a full year before the film hit theaters. It also led unsuspecting visitors to believe that it was documenting a real story, not a fictional one. As The Drum points out, it offered a timeline of events of the Blair Witch story and had biographical information on the “missing” filmmakers. The Drum notes that the site got more than 20 million pageviews before the film hit theaters; that would be an impressive number for a new film (or a documentary) in 2024; in 1999, it was a mindblowing figure. 

As horror film blog Bloody Disgusting recalls, the Sci-Fi channel (which has since been rebranded as SyFy) aired a fake documentary Curse of the Blair Witch. This was brilliant marketing: there was never an acknowledgment that this was fiction (other than that it aired on a network that specialized in science fiction). “Through archival footage and interviews with friends and family of Heather, Mike and Josh, the hour-long special presents itself as a serious documentary about the ‘real’ story behind the (then) upcoming Blair Witch Project.”

Bloody Disgusting also notes, “While there are occasional excerpts from the film to hype up its release, the meat of the special consists [of] expanding the mythology behind the titular witch and the crimes inspired by her story.” Back then, most people generally believed what they saw in media; this was well before the era of disinformation, misinformation and “fake news.” 

The film itself was shot and edited brilliantly; to the layman (and maybe even to some film experts), it looks like it was pieced together from found or recovered footage. Seeing a film made up of that kind of footage was surprising; it wouldn’t be today, as everyone has the ability to be a filmmaker and documentarian with their phones. And even then, we may not always believe that the footage that we’re seeing is “real”; we all know about filters, deepfakes, greenscreens and A.I. Those things didn’t exist back then. 

The Blair Witch Project's premise was fearsome: three filmmakers go into the woods to investigate a legend and soon realize that there is something very, very wrong. Sure, The Blair Witch Project had an incredible marketing campaign, but the story held up. It’s still scary and compelling today. 

And here, we have to give a shout out to Rei Hance, Michael C. Williams and Joshua Leonard. Directors Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez actually left the actors in the woods with cameras and gave them some direction, but much of the movie was improvised by the actors, who really sold it. The reason why so many people thought it was a documentary was because the actors did such a credible job making you believe that they were in true danger. 

The actors have recently made a push to get retroactive royalties from the film, which grossed nearly $250 million. Per the New York Times, the trio did not make a lot of money for the movie (they say that Hance said she was paid $1,000 for two weeks of work). They were eventually paid $300,000 when they were bought out of their 1% stake of the film. Leonard told the Times that they weren’t involved in the buyout negotiations. 

And this has become more relevant recently, as Lionsgate has announced plans to revive the franchise. Again. You’d be excused for forgetting about 2000’s rush-released Book Of Shadows: Blair Witch 2; even the 2016 sequel Blair Witch pretended it never happened. And most fans who have seen either or both of those flops have tried to forget about them. They added nothing to the story and only served to detract from the original’s impact.

However, per Variety, the next attempt at reviving the franchise will be produced by Jason Blum’s Blumhouse Productions, a company that owes some debt to The Blair Witch Project. Blumhouse Productions is known for horror films that are made on a low budget and yield tremendous profits, including Paranormal Activity, Insidious and Sinister.

The thing about horror movies is that the villain has to be compelling for you to want to see more installments, whether it’s Jason Voorhees, Michael Myers, Freddie Kruger, Jigsaw, or Pinhead. And most fans will admit that each of those villains loses their impact after a while; most franchises become parodies of themselves after a few chapters. In The Blair Witch Project, we don’t really see the Blair Witch. What we’re really afraid of is the unknown. The lucky few thousand who saw the film before the world realized that it was really just a movie are the ones who got the film’s real impact. And that’s something that this franchise can never really reproduce. 

Before many actors made it big, their first shot on the big screen began in a horror movie. Some of our favorite actors who starred in some laughable excuses for horror flicks went on to become some of the most world-renowned actors of all time. However, to see them in such a raw state can be just as entertaining as a critically acclaimed film.

Many people don't know that Leonardo DiCaprio's very first movie role was as Josh in Critters 3 in 1991. The movie was a direct-to-video release. It also happens to be the only sequel Leo has ever taken part in. The following year, he appeared in another horror film alongside Drew Barrymore titled Poison Ivy. DiCaprio commented on his first film role, stating: "I admit I've done a few lousy roles in the beginning of my career, like my role in Critters 3. But at that age, you'll do anything for attention!" Two years later, he landed his breakout role in What's Eating Gilbert Grape.

Then, Angela Bassett took a shot at the Critters franchise, appearing in the fourth installment, which was filmed simultaneously with DiCaprio's. Unlike Leo, she was already an adult trying to get her big break in the entertainment industry. Though 1992's Critters 4 was even worse than the third one, Bassett thankfully made a statement with Boyz n the Hood, which came out the same year. Bassett didn't get her fill of horror flicks, going on to star in two horror films in 1995: Strange Days with Ralph Fiennes, then in Vampire in Brooklyn with Eddie Murphy.

The same year he starred in Clueless, Paul Rudd also starred in a horrible horror sequel: Halloween 6: The Curse of Michael Myers. Just two months after Clueless premiered in 1995, Rudd starred as the grown-up version of Tommy Doyle in this confusing Halloween sequel.

Before Brad Pitt oozed sex appeal in 1999's Fight Club as Tyler Durden, he starred in this comical slasher flick a decade prior called Cutting Class. His character's name is Dwight Ingalls in the "whodunit" movie that takes place in a high school. Young Brad's Dwight is one of the suspects/potential victims.

Aniston's first acting credits were in television shows that were quickly cancelled in 1990. Three years later, she starred in her first movie. At 24 years old, Aniston starred as Tory Redding in the comical horror film Leprechaun. She has expressed embarrassment over her role saying, “There’s loads of movies where you’re thinking: ‘Oh god, this is just… how am I going to survive this in my future?’ And then it’s a cult… ‘something’ because it’s so embarrassing.” Aniston shared that when she and Justin Theroux were dating, they watched the movie together, and she found it tough to watch. As cringe as Leprechaun was for Jen, it did lead to her her breakout role as Rachel in Friends for the next ten years.

In the first installment in Wes Craven's A Nightmare on Elm Street franchise, Depp set the high bar of being a hottie in a horror film. In the 1984 classic slasher film, who could forget that Johnny wore that cropped football jersey?! When crop tops became a thing in recent years, photos of young Johnny in this film circulated online having women gushing over the sex appeal of a man being able to pull it off. However, his character in the film was famously eaten by the bed, so we didn't see him for long in the film. Depp would go on and star in some of our favorite dark and horror films in his career, including Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street and Edward Scissorhands.

The critically-acclaimed actor had a long way to go before reaching success as an actor. Eight years before Hanks made his first big splash in 1988's Big, his very first role was starring in a horror slasher film. Titled He Knows You’re Alone, Hanks shows off his charisma in a small role as a psychology college student named Elliot. This film has been referenced to as a Halloween knockoff, sharing many similarities with the classic horror series. The plot follows a woman who is stalked by a killer targeting soon-to-be brides the weekend before her wedding.

Before Matthew McConaughey became our beloved "Rust" in True Detective, the actor starred in a 1995 sequel in the Texas Chainsaw series. He starred alongside another newcomer to the acting scene, Renee Zellweger in The Return of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre which was later re-edited and re-titled two years later to Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation. McConaughey played the role of a villain named Vilmer Slaughter, working together with Leatherface. He made his film debut in Dazed and Confused a year prior, but wasn't widely recognized yet.

The "Scream Queen" that we all know and love followed in her [inlink id="jamie-lee-curtis-psycho" text="mother's footsteps"]. Janet Leigh famously met a grisly end in the shower in Alfred Hitchcock's 1960 classic horror film, Psycho. Curtis made her film debut as Laurie Strode in John Carpenter’s Halloween (1978). The film was a major success and was the highest-grossing independent film of its time, earning accolades as a classic horror film. Since then, Curtis has reprised the role for over forty years in sequels Halloween II (1981), Halloween H20: 20 Years Later (1998), Halloween: Resurrection (2002), Halloween (2018), Halloween Kills (2021), and Halloween Ends (2022). Curtis landed other horror roles in films like 1980’s The Fog, Prom Night and Terror Train and 1981’s Roadgames. And of course, she recently won an Oscar for her role in Everything Everywhere All At Once.

Before the youngest Olsen sister became Marvel's Wanda Maximoff, she made her film debut in 2011 in Silent House. Olsen starred as Sarah, who is working with her father and uncle to renovate an old family home to prepare it for sale. Long vacant, the house has no utilities, forcing the trio to rely on battery-operated lanterns to light their way. Sarah becomes separated from her relatives and soon finds she is trapped inside the cabin, with no contact with the outside world. The movie premiered at Sundance at the same time as the thriller Martha Marcy May Marlene, which earned her critical acclaim.

Anya Taylor-Joy's very first film credit was as Thomasin in the acclaimed folk horror film, A24's The Witch in 2015. Set in 1630s New England; its plot follows a Puritan family who encounters forces of evil in the woods beyond their farm. She received critical acclaim at just 18 years old and went on to star in the horror film Split a year later, and its sequel Glass (2019), before landing her most widely recognized roles in Emma, The Queen's Gambit, and The Menu.