The summer of 1999 had big things planned for the supernatural horror genre. In the midst of high-budget blockbuster movies emerged a small Indie movie named The Blair Witch Project. Directed by two University of Central Florida students, Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez, the movie drew inspiration from Steven Spielberg’s 1975 masterpiece Jaws.
Initially many studios dismissed it, considering it a risky venture. However, The Blair Witch project brought in an incredible $248.6 million worldwide, despite having a $60,000 shooting budget. Further, the movie continues to haunt the audience even after 25 years of its release.
How Steven Spielberg’s Jaws inspired The Blair Witch Project
The movie, which tells the tale of three student filmmakers named Heather Donahue, Michael C. Williams, and Joshua Leonard, was a major factor in polarizing the found-footage horror genre. To document the Blair Witch legend, the three of them head into the Maryland woods.
While the three students disappear in the woods, their cameras and equipment are discovered a year later. From the camera, several pieces of footage are recovered that they had recorded, and this is what the audience sees in the movie.
The makers took inspiration from several movies and documentaries, like The Shining and The Omen, to fuel their horror movie. But they specifically stated that Steven Spielberg‘s Jaws, which in itself is based on a real story, was one of the main conceptual inspirations for the movie (via Grunge).
From Jaws, they got inspired to bring in the concept of building fear through the unseen presence of the shark, which happened largely due to the infamous challenges that the crew had to deal with while shooting the movie (via Collider). In order to achieve this, they used a similar technique in the movie.
They made a decision not to visually reveal the Blair Witch, hence creating a sense of mystery. In such a case, viewers will be forced to utilize their imagination in this situation, which will heighten the suspense. This idea was initially dismissed by a lot of studios, but given the huge success of the movie, the makers managed to prove everyone wrong.
With its eerie atmosphere and haunted plot, The Blair Witch Project not only haunted the general public but also the horror maestro Stephen King.
The Blair Witch Project terrified Stephen King
Most people would much rather watch a movie in the comfort of their own homes or in a theater. However, Stephen King saw The Blair Witch Project for the first time while being treated in a hospital after being struck by a negligent minivan driver.
In an interview (via Slash Film), he added:
The first time I saw ‘Blair Witch’ was in a hospital room about twelve days after a careless driver in a minivan smashed the sh*t out of me on a country road. I was, in a manner of speaking, the perfect viewer: roaring with pain from top to bottom, high on painkillers, and looking at a poorly copied bootleg videotape on a portable TV.
He further added that when, in the movie, the characters started discovering strange symbols hanging from the tree, he asked his son to “turn the damn thing off.” Further admitting that this was the first time in his life that he left a horror movie midway as he was too frightened to continue watching it.
For his fear, he explained that it might have been due to the painkillers or the raw footage of the movie that made everything seem very real. The idea of a footage-based movie brought a huge realism aspect to it. As King summed up perfectly, “The idea is complete genius, and a big budget would have wrecked it.”
You can watch The Blair Witch Project as well as Jaws on Apple TV.
