Editorials
Why ‘Blair Witch’ is so Important and Exciting to so Many People
Last night brought one of the most exciting horror announcements in probably the last decade: The Woods is actually Blair Witch, the third film in the franchise that began in 1999. Our own Brad Miska saw it several months ago and hailed it as the, “…game-changer horror fans desperately have been waiting for” and saying that it, “…breaks the mold of traditional horror and pushes the boundaries to the absolute brink.” You can read his full review right here.
This news set off what can only be described as a detonation of excitement across social media. There was a frenzy of people powering through incredulity and the vast majority of them arriving at a place of sheer glee and wonder.
As I watched this mass explosion of passion and delight, I found myself going back to when the first film came out and thinking about why it still has such an impact today. What follows are my own personal thoughts and opinions.
I remember when The Blair Witch Project was coming out. They hype around the movie was absolutely insane. It was written about in high-profile magazines, it was spoken about on talk shows… It was the water cooler hot topic discussion for a while and all for very good reason. The push was that this movie was groundbreaking, that it was the most terrifying movie in a long, long time.
But what set this movie apart was that the push wasn’t just how scary it was but also the attempt to keep up appearances that the events in the movie actually happened. This tactic was done through absolutely genius marketing that simply cannot be replicated these days.
You see, when they were pushing The Blair Witch Project the internet was a vastly different place. Google had been around for only a year and people were still using services like AOL or search engines like Yahoo, AskJeeves, Lycos, etc… Something to keep in mind about these search engines is that they weren’t exactly too hot at bringing the most accurate search results. The search engine game was still being worked on, something that Google was nailing but still building the user base for.
Not just content to create their own website, which is still around, I remember there being other websites created that corroborated the events in the film and added to the mythology. So what happened is that I went to search for “The Blair Witch Project fake or real” and the results made it seem like it was actually real. Furthermore, if you went to IMDb and searched for the stars of the movie, they were listed as “missing, presumed dead” (source). The studio planned it all this way and pretty much everyone fell for it, hook, line, and sinker. It was nothing short of incredible.
The marketing ploy worked and the film, which had an estimated budget of $60,000, went on to earn nearly $250 million worldwide, making it one of the best return-on-investment films ever released.
These days, search engines are so efficient that any attempt at creating a hoax will quickly be sniffed out and labeled as such. Snopes is almost always the internet user’s best friend but sometimes, just sometimes, it can be a real stick in the mud.
One question that I saw come up a few times (not often, mind you) on social media was essentially a rephrasing of, “Who cares? What does it matter?” After all, Blair Witch 2: Book of Shadows was critically panned (although there are those who defend it), so why should people be excited for a third film that took 16 years to arrive? Honestly, those are fair questions. For many people, The Blair Witch Project wasn’t something they were a part of. Perhaps they were too young to appreciate the brilliance of the marketing. Maybe they never watched the original until found footage became a huge thing, so it felt like it couldn’t really compete against films like Paranormal Activity or [REC], which moved at a far brisker pace and definitely brought more in the way of visual trickery.
But what I’m seeing here is much the same as what I saw when Jurassic World or Star Wars: The Force Awakens came out. The high school and college kids who saw the first film in theaters have aged to the point that they might have kids that are old enough to see Blair Witch with them. It’s not just a horror movie, it’s a celebration of nostalgia while simultaneously passing the torch on to a new generation. For many, that alone is something worth celebrating. That is something to be excited about because it’s a chance to connect to our own youth and relive those days when we felt terror. Only this time we’re not alone.
Last night the horror community bonded over this reveal and it was a glorious sight. It was the kind of event that reminded me how our passion can surpass our differences. Sure, we may not agree on the worth of remakes and we definitely don’t always see eye-to-eye when it comes to the use of CGI over practical FX. But those can all be put to the side when we recognize that there is the potential for a great story, one that will shake us to our core.
That’s the power of Blair Witch. That’s what it awoke in all of us. Whether the world agrees with Brad’s review or not after September 16th doesn’t really matter. What does matter is that nearly all of us came together in joy and hope that we’d be seeing something special. That right there made it all worthwhile for me.
Editorials
‘Leprechaun Returns’ – The Charm of the Franchise’s Legacy Sequel
The erratic Leprechaun franchise is not known for sticking with a single concept for too long. The namesake (originally played by Warwick Davis) has gone to L.A., Las Vegas, space, and the ‘hood (not once but twice). And after an eleven-year holiday since the Davis era ended, the character received a drastic makeover in a now-unmentionable reboot. The critical failure of said film would have implied it was time to pack away the green top hat and shillelagh, and say goodbye to the nefarious imp. Instead, the Leprechaun series tried its luck again.
The general consensus for the Leprechaun films was never positive, and the darker yet blander Leprechaun: Origins certainly did not sway opinions. Just because the 2014 installment took itself seriously did not mean viewers would. After all, creator Mark Jones conceived a gruesome horror-comedy back in the early nineties, and that format is what was expected of any future ventures. So as horror legacy sequels (“legacyquels”) became more common in the 2010s, Leprechaun Returns followed suit while also going back to what made the ‘93 film work. This eighth entry echoed Halloween (2018) by ignoring all the previous sequels as well as being a direct continuation of the original. Even ardent fans can surely understand the decision to wipe the slate clean, so to speak.
Leprechaun Returns “continued the [franchise’s] trend of not being consistent by deciding to be consistent.” The retconning of Steven Kostanski and Suzanne Keilly’s film was met with little to no pushback from the fandom, who had already become accustomed to seeing something new and different with every chapter. Only now the “new and different” was familiar. With the severe route of Origins a mere speck in the rearview mirror, director Kotanski implemented a “back to basics” approach that garnered better reception than Zach Lipovsky’s own undertaking. The one-two punch of preposterous humor and grisly horror was in full force again.
With Warwick Davis sitting this film out — his own choice — there was the foremost challenge of finding his replacement. Returns found Davis’ successor in Linden Porco, who admirably filled those blood-stained, buckled shoes. And what would a legacy sequel be without a returning character? Jennifer Aniston obviously did not reprise her final girl role of Tory Redding. So, the film did the next best thing and fetched another of Lubdan’s past victims: Ozzie, the likable oaf played by Mark Holton. Returns also created an extension of Tory’s character by giving her a teenage daughter, Lila (Taylor Spreitler).
It has been twenty-five years since the events of the ‘93 film. The incident is unknown to all but its survivors. Interested in her late mother’s history there in Devil’s Lake, North Dakota, Lila transferred to the local university and pledged a sorority — really the only one on campus — whose few members now reside in Tory Redding’s old home. The farmhouse-turned-sorority-house is still a work in progress; Lila’s fellow Alpha Epsilon sisters were in the midst of renovating the place when a ghost of the past found its way into the present.
The Psycho Goreman and The Void director’s penchant for visceral special effects is noted early on as the Leprechaun tears not only into the modern age, but also through poor Ozzie’s abdomen. The portal from 1993 to 2018 is soaked with blood and guts as the Leprechaun forces his way into the story. Davis’ iconic depiction of the wee antagonist is missed, however, Linden Porco is not simply keeping the seat warm in case his predecessor ever resumes the part. His enthusiastic performance is accentuated by a rotten-looking mug that adds to his innate menace.
The obligatory fodder is mostly young this time around. Apart from one luckless postman and Ozzie — the premature passing of the latter character removed the chance of caring about anyone in the film — the Leprechaun’s potential prey are all college aged. Lila is this story’s token trauma kid with caregiver baggage; her mother thought “monsters were always trying to get her.” Lila’s habit of mentioning Tory’s mental health problem does not make a good first impression with the resident mean girl and apparent alcoholic of the sorority, Meredith (Emily Reid). Then there are the nicer but no less cursorily written of the Alpha Epsilon gals: eco-conscious and ex-obsessive Katie (Pepi Sonuga), and uptight overachiever Rose (Sai Bennett). Rounding out the main cast are a pair of destined-to-die bros (Oliver Llewellyn Jenkins, Ben McGregor). Lila and her peers range from disposable to plain irritating, so rooting for any one of them is next to impossible. Even so, their overstated personalities make their inevitable fates more satisfying.
Where Returns excels is its death sequences. Unlike Jones’ film, this one is not afraid of killing off members of the main cast. Lila, admittedly, wears too much plot armor, yet with her mother’s spirit looming over her and the whole story — comedian Heather McDonald put her bang-on Aniston impersonation to good use as well as provided a surprisingly emotional moment in the film — her immunity can be overlooked. Still, the other characters’ brutal demises make up for Lila’s imperviousness. The Leprechaun’s killer set-pieces also happen to demonstrate the time period, seeing as he uses solar panels and a drone in several supporting characters’ executions. A premortem selfie and the antagonist’s snarky mention of global warming additionally add to this film’s particular timestamp.
Critics were quick to say Leprechaun Returns did not break new ground. Sure, there is no one jetting off to space, or the wacky notion of Lubdan becoming a record producer. This reset, however, is still quite charming and entertaining despite its lack of risk-taking. And with yet another reboot in the works, who knows where the most wicked Leprechaun ever to exist will end up next.
Horror contemplates in great detail how young people handle inordinate situations and all of life’s unexpected challenges. While the genre forces characters of every age to face their fears, it is especially interested in how youths might fare in life-or-death scenarios.
The column Young Blood is dedicated to horror stories for and about teenagers, as well as other young folks on the brink of terror.
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