Writer: Simon Barrett
Starring: James Allen McCune, Callie Hernandez, Corbin Reid, and Brandon Scott
I think I've made it pretty clear what I think of Adam Wingard in previous reviews: he's a hack. He's an unoriginal filmmaker who gets heaps of praise primarily because one of his best friends is Brad Miska, the man who founded, and runs, horror news site Bloody Disgusting. This ensures every one of his films is overhyped to thousands of rabid horror fans, who eagerly gobble up what they've been force-fed, and go to the theaters with the mindset that they are watching a true genius in action. In fact, Miska produced A Horrible Way to Die, Wingard's first horrible film, and then moved on to the V/H/S trilogy, of which Wingard directed a segment in the first one.
The case continues with Blair Witch, on which Miska did not have a (credited) hand, but who was sure to have two quotes in the first trailer (including “one of the scariest films ever made” despite it clearly not being anything close to that), and who went on and on in endless hyperbolic praise about how much of a “game changer” it is in a 4.5/5 skull review on his own website (read the comments to see how well that went over).
The original Blair Witch Project actually was, for its time at least, one of the scariest films ever made. The brilliant marketing strategy had people believing that it was, in fact, real, and the film's refusal to show its monster (or witch, as it were) is the reason for the film's success. But time, over which thousands (perhaps literally, or perhaps just an over-exaggeration based on perception) of similar films have ripped off its conceit, has not been kind to the original: I tried watching it again a couple of years ago and couldn't even make it halfway through. What was once an effective piece of horror has since been watered down by the many films that ripped it off; while I still admire it and would consider it an essential piece of horror, it lacks almost all of the power that it once had.
Well, the only thing Adam Wingard and Simon Barrett's remake/re-imagining/sequel/whatever it is seems to have taken from the original, is that screaming characters running through woods is the only thing that made it work, because that's all we get for just about the whole thing. Oh, and CGI monsters. In other words, take everything that is weak about not just found footage films, but horror films in general, and you know exactly what to expect from this one.
But you know what? I don't even place most of the blame on Wingard (or even his frequent writing partner Barrett) for this poorly scripted mess; this is no doubt the ill-advised idea of an idiot studio executive who decided to cash in on a franchise was that was past its shelf date fifteen years ago. In studio fare like this, it's hard to tell just how many ideas the studio pushed upon Wingard and Barrett, so I can't even chastise them for all the poor decisions and characterizations that are inflicted upon the poor, hapless audience. Truth be told, the odds were stacked against anyone dumb (or desperate) enough to take this project; I can't imagine any genre filmmaker that could have taken this idea and turned it into a formidable film.
The original clearly had the upper hand by being one of the first films to do what it did, but beyond that, also had a believable cast that looked like everyday people. The mostly-improvised dialogue (and scare scenes) also pushed the authenticity a little farther, to the point that it wasn't hard to see why so many people fell for the idea that it was real footage. This Blair Witch reboot/remake/re-imagining fails from the first frame, in which we're told basically the same thing as we were told in the original: that this movie is made up of real found footage. Yeah, like this isn't a gimmick that was beaten completely to death ten years ago. Then we get our first glimpse of the attractive cast of “Dawson's Creek”-style characters, who are clearly reciting bad lines, poorly. Great idea, Lionsgate execs!
I suppose I should touch upon the plot, as threadbare and repetitive as it is: James Donahue believes he sees his sister in a YouTube video of the old cabin from the first Blair Witch, and enlists the aide of three friends to go help find her. The online footage was supposedly found out in the woods by a couple of locals, Lane and Talia, who are obsessed with the myths; they refuse to reveal where they found the tape unless James and his crew takes them along. Reluctantly, they agree.
Then, if you've seen the first film, you've pretty much seen the rest: The crew hear creepy things in the woods, go to leave, find they're running around in circles, lose “map” (which in this case is a GPS signal, as technological updates are the only real difference), then spend the rest of the time running and screaming each others' names while evading evil spirits that we can't see. Only, we do catch glimpses of the “creatures” stalking their prey, and they look like featureless grey CGI aliens. Wow, scary.
The only time the film actually comes alive is at the end, when the remaining survivors stumble upon an old cabin in the woods. Here, the film is given a much-needed digression from the tired wood setting, and where the tight corridors and small rooms become constricting, leading to a heart-stopping scene in a tunnel that's literally the first inkling I've ever seen that Wingard has the capabilities to render an emotion besides hatred or indifference out of his audience. There's also another effective scene near the end when the remaining survivors can't look at a creature in the same room as them...but that's completely undone a few seconds later when we get a glimpse of a poorly done CGI monster that, once again, runs counter to the effectiveness of the Blair Witch franchise.
It's rare that a movie made in 2016 already feels outdated four months after release, but that's what happens when you're a major studio trying to follow an irrelevant blueprint just to make a few bucks off someone else's idea. Who says there's no karma in Hollywood?
RATING: 3/10
TRAILER
No comments:
Post a Comment