“I’ll be watching you..”
Almost 2 decades after the original “Blair Witch Project” aired and made the found footage style of storytelling a staple (and overused) for horror movies, the witch is back. The original film told the tale of 3 film students (Heather Donahue, Joshua Leonard, Michael C. Williams) who’ve traveled to a small town to film a documentary about the Blair Witch, a legendary local murderer.
The film was so unexpectedly successful, it became a resounding box office success–grossing over USD248 million worldwide, making it one of the most successful independent movies of all time. It also led viewers to believe that it (the students disappearing and the recovery of their footage) really happened because of the nature in which the fictional story was told.
Now, 17 years later, it has been revealed that a sequel to the 1999 scarefest will be released before the year ends.
Simply titled, “Blair Witch”, a trailer for the sequel was released over the weekend during the Lionsgate panel at the 2016 San Diego Comic-Con (SDCC). In fact, Lionsgate managed to pull off coup and sprung the entire finished movie for a theatre full of unsuspecting fans who were under the impression that they were going to watch a new horror flick called “The Woods”.
You see, Lionsgate kept “Blair Witch” under wraps and stealthily filmed the movie entirely in secret in Vancouver last year under the working title, “The Woods”. Only a select group of people knew the true nature of the film they were shooting and even the cast were excluded from the knowledge that they were making a “Blair Witch” sequel. It was only after SDCC that the movie was officially renamed “Blair Witch” and Lionsgate has maintained that it is “Not a reboot. Not a prequel. An old fashioned straight-up sequel.”
The official synopsis is as follows:
“A group of college students ventures into the Black Hills Forest in Maryland to uncover the mysteries surrounding the disappearance of James Donahue’s sister, Heather, who many believe is connected to the legend of the Blair Witch after her disappearance 15 years prior. At first the group is hopeful, especially when a pair of locals offer to act as guides through the dark and winding woods, but as the endless night wears on, the group is visited by a menacing presence. Slowly, they begin to realise the legend is all too real and more sinister than they could have imagined.”
Are you ready? Watch the super creepy trailer below:
Directed by Adam Wingard (“Outcast, “Death Note”), “Blair Witch” stars James Allen McCune, Valorie Curry, Callie Hernandez, Brandon Scott, Wes Robinson, and Corbin Reid. The film is set to be released on 16th September 2016.
For more information, visit the movie’s Facebook page.
