If you liked "The Blair Witch Project," gird yourself. The nicest thing the sequel, "Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2," has been called is "a jaw-dropping calamity of staggering ineptitude." But, hang on.
The first five minutes of the new film have been lauded by the same reviewer. Now it's a matter of whether the popcorn is good enough to sit through the remaining minutes.
By now everybody knows the story of the original film where a small group of film makers travel into the Maryland woods in search of the Blair Witch and are never heard from again, though their film is recaptured.
The sequel takes up in the original BW town of Burkittsville, Md., which is now besieged by thrill-seekers coming for a tour of the area advertised on the Internet by a recently released mental patient, Jeff Patterson.
After an altercation with a rival tour group early on, Patterson's group pitch a tent, sleep out and have quite a night which they can't remember due to the good offices of alcohol and drugs.
Meantime, the other tour group is found brutally murdered the following morning and Patterson's followers become the main suspects.
The opening five minutes is shot in the Blair Witch handheld style, which director Joe Berlinger is most associated with. Snippets of BW hype are shown, including a Roger Ebert review, followed by man-in-the-street interviews with Burkittsville residents. Alas, it's apparently all downhill from that point on. One reviewer speculates that the actors were chosen at random out of the phone book.
The movie isn't allowed to be shown in the town's ( pop. 194) one theater. They really don't like the publicity. And BW2 has its own website, The Blair Witch Legend.com. However, you won't find too much information there, for instance who plays tour leader Jeff Patterson, or how long the movie is, but you can purchase BW T-shirts and the like.
It is rated R for violence, language, sexuality and drug use.
It starts Thursday at Diamond Cinemas..
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