`Blair Witch 2:' Book of stupidity
By JUDE SEYMOUR
Scene Movie Critic
In the recent political debates, both Al Gore and George W. Bush have assured potential voters that they seek to regulate the movie industry. While both candidates refuse to use the word "censorship," their measures would, in practice, limit what is both seen and heard on the screen.
Hollywood and free speech advocates are staunchly opposed, claiming that any nudity or violence on screen is justified by the merits of each individual film. If George W. Bush or Al Gore go out to see "Blair Witch 2: Book of Shadows," Hollywood just might be looking at government intervention.
"Blair Witch 2" is filled with unnecessary images. There is implied sex in many of the scenes, as characters either fantasize about their group mates or actually put those fantasizes into action. There are many snippets of nudity, but not none of them strengthen a character's dynamic or advance the plot. These flashes of nudity could have easily hit the editing floor.
As for the violence, it is equally superfluous. One of the main successes of "The Blair Witch Project" was that it suggested so much terror without showing it. Violence happened to the characters, but usually off screen. The suggestion of what was lurking in the woods was scared the pants off of every moviegoer.
"Blair Witch 2" is littered with flashes of stabbings, hangings, guttings, decapitations and other overly violent images. The third element that is also gratuitous is the drinking and pot-smoking. Within the first twenty minutes, five people who do not know each other are smoking marijuana and drinking Pete's Wicked Ale in gluttonous doses.
In most cases, scenes involving any kind of debauchery are intertwined in a good plot, which helps soften the graphic images that the director has exposed the audience to. "Blair Witch 2" has no such goodness in its plot. The movie lingers in its stupidity.
The five characters in the movie claim that they are sick of people capitalizing off the movie's name. But this is exactly what the movie is doing. There is no connection to the first "Blair Witch" movie at all, except that each one of the characters in this movie are drawn to the Black Hills in Maryland because they "liked the movie." In fact, there isn't even a "book of shadows."
The success of the first movie was based on the characters. Whether the audience loved or hated Heather, Mike and Josh, their reactions to all that was happening around them seemed believable. This was done through the "documentary feel," or capturing the action exclusively on video. Video has a reputation of being unpolished, and watching the characters deliver improvisedlines seemed more spontaneous and unrehearsed.
Since "Blair Witch 2" was shot on film, that spontaneity is replaced with characters who are trying to act real, but sound like they are reading from a terrible script. The movie languishes in scene after scene of terrible dialogue, with a plot that accomplishes nothing.
Each character is a bad stereotype as well. Jeff (Jeffrey Donovan) is the townie, obsessed with a quick buck. Kim (Kim Director) is a "Goth chick" who is fascinated with the occult and the movies, especially (to no one's surprise) "The Blair Witch Project." Erica (Erica Leerhsen) is a "good witch," a person who uses spells to promote nature and good effects. Tristine (Tristine Skylar) and Stephen (Stephen Barker Turner) are co-writers of a book about the Blair Witch, and are touring the Black Hills to finish their research.
In the end, two of these characters are dead, and sufficient reasoning is not given for either one of their deaths, except with the understanding that "we all go a little crazy sometimes."
The "Blair Witch Project" was a movie that could have survived without a sequel (or a third installment, slated for 2001). Making a movie about the effects of the first movie would have been a better approach. Creating a sequel that muddles the power of the first movie is bad practice.
It is unfortunate that the success of the first film, with its miniscule budget and its staggering box office power, will be overlooked by its much lesser (and much less thought out) sequel.
--1 out of 5 shamrocks
All Scene Stories for Thursday, November 2, 2000
