31 Days of Halloween 2017: Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2

2000, Joe Berlinger (mostly documentaries) -- download

Umm, I am not even sure there is any book in the movie.

That was just terrible. It starts off decently enough, throwing back meta to the popularity generated by the first movie, but assuming that most of the viewing fans thought it was a true documentary. Burkittsville has become a haven for people who want to wander the woods and experience the scares. Jeff (a very young Jeffrey Donovan) has a thriving business doing tours. This one gathers Stephen and Tristen, researching a book, Erica the Wiccan who wants to commune with the Blair Witch to calm her down (she is giving witches a bad rep!) and Kim the Hollywood Goth, who claims to be a medium.

 They spend their first night in the woods, near some ruins, only to waken in the morning to find their camp trashed. Cameras are smashed, tents are wrecked and all the book research is shredded into confetti. Umm, why did you bring ALL your book material into the woods with you? Nobody remembers what happened the night before. Then Goth Girl has a vision of where tapes are hidden and the accusations begins, a small nod to the first as tension quickly rises. And then Tristen has a miscarriage (!!!).

The rest of the movie is spent at Jeff's abandoned warehouse turned crash pad. Why? The bunch must be tired and traumatized; why didn't they just go their separate ways, i.e. go home? But whatever, the bulk of the movie is not in any woods, but focused around hallucinations and paranoia and ghostly visions and owls while they hide out inside the warehouse. Its all rather boring Straight To Video horror movie.

From what I learned, Berlinger had a movie more focused on mass hysteria, but the studio wanted something more in the way of a traditional sequel. So, they just re-shot and re-edited his movie and produced this trash.