Henry Turberfield, '26
The famous Blair Witch Project, most notable for its low original budget of $35-60k, got its fame due to its unique take on horror films. Written by Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez, the story follows three filmmakers wanting to make a documentary about the Blair Witch. In an urban myth in a town that swears it's real, the three want to tell the whole truth around it. The story is presented as “found footage”, and in fact, it’s one of the first found footage movies to hit the box office. Although the real first found footage movie was Cannibal Holocaust, Blair Witch Project made the genre universally popular. The Blair Witch was one of the first movies to utilize the internet to market its movie. The movie became so popular, because people back then didn’t have the technology to disprove the movie. Many people thought it was real.
What starts as an innocent exploration into the woods of the Blair Witch turns dark really fast. The three filmmakers, Heather, Josh, and Mike, go to a town close to the woods in Burkittsville, Maryland. There, the group interviews a few people about what they’ve heard about the Blair Witch. There were two fishermen, and one of them described the Blair Witch as an old woman whose feet never touched the ground. The other described the witch as a gray mist that rose out of the water. A townsperson, Mary, claims to have had a direct encounter with the Blair Witch. She describes the Blair Witch as a woman with long, dark hair all over her body emitting a presence that could be felt. During this time, many kids started to disappear. The man who lived in the woods, Russel Parr, committed a series of murders on children. He would bring the children down in pairs and make one stand in the corner while he murdered the other. We later see this same scene at the end of the movie, where Mike is seen standing in the corner and Heather falls.
The ending of the movie is very vague and open to interpretation. Most believe that the Blair Witch killed Josh and then used his voice to lure Heather and Mike down to the basement. But, one theorist points out the flaws of the movie. The YouTube channel, Film Theorists, points out the inconsistencies in the guys in the movie. First of all, Josh and Mike aren’t getting paid to do this but out of the good of their heart. Josh is Heather’s ex-boyfriend, and Mike is Josh’s friend. Heather doesn’t know Mike. She also states in her diary that, “Josh doesn’t listen to me at all, and he’s supposed to be my friend. Mike is more respectful and I don’t know d*ck about him.” There’s already tension between Josh and Heather and him doing a movie for her where he has to hike miles into the woods. This movie was set in the 1990’s, so the film equipment was heavy too. Film Theorist also points out that the map was always in Heather’s pocket. She was the one who knew where to go. That being said, in most of the movie, the guys are leading the group. But after hiking for hours, the guys say they don’t remember any of the nature around them. They make Heather give them the map, and then it cuts to the next morning, the map suddenly missing. We then learn that the map was kicked into the creek by Mike. The one guy who said, “this is Greek to me” had the map at one point, able to kick it into the creek. After a bunch of arguing, Mike says they are going “this way”, because “it’s the way we’ve been going all day”. After moving in the same direction all day, the guys just switch direction, and Heather has to follow. On top of that, Mike is the one carrying the compass! Mike, the one brought along to do sound, is carrying a bunch of sound equipment, some of which uses neodymium magnets. Neodymium magnets are one of the only magnets able to alter a compass’s tell.
Film Theorist also points out that the ending in the film also makes no sense regarding the story. In the middle of the night, Mike bolts off. He leads Heather into the house, chasing Josh’s voice. As he runs in, he calls out where he’s going like someone who is trying to lead another person to his voice. He then runs upstairs just to run all the way to the basement. He then gets hit, then Heather. The director of the movie, Eduardo Sánchez, even questions in an interview, “why wouldn’t Mike turn to Heather’s screams?” proving this intentionality. This proves Mike was able to turn to Heather but chose not to, instead facing the corner. Film Theorist's final point is that this movie is found footage, meaning someone recovered this without having any encounter with the Blair Witch.
This theory makes more sense than the movie does. The whole movie is filled with suspense, having the audience think something will jump out, but nothing does. A movie filled with screaming and arguing to just end with the last footage showing Mike in a corner has an anticlimactic ending. The murder of Heather was all planned out. There was a motive; they had a plan, and they got away with it.