If you’re ever surprised by how clueless we, as a people, appear to be sometimes, just remember that a scant 25 years ago The Blair Witch project came out and 90% of the population was like “holy shit is this REAL?!”
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In the 50s psychologists started tracking “do you think cartoons are real” among kids; it usually floats around 5 or 6 years before they know for sure.
Marketer here! Still stunned when colleagues (mostly PhDs) bring obvs spam they've received to me to consider b/c they believe it to be personal email. No -- request GDPR suppression & block. Luckily, I'm responsible for a brand which requires emphasis on quality + accuracy. No other way for me.
If I'm correct, I believe they were one of the first movies to have a website dedicated to the 'lore' which also tricked a tonne of people into believing it was real. The internet in 1999 was barely internet at that time.
I feel like they even put out documentaries about the story before the movie came out if I remember correctly. It was genius marketing. I believe it made the movie better as well.
I was in hs, the internet wasn't a consistent or reliable thing in my household and on my way otd my mother, very social, says "Oh I heard that was real"
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I was a scared kid in that theater lemme tell you
I don’t remember documentaries but there was a website dedicated to the “researchers” that added to the belief-especially at the time because the internet was still kinda new to a lot of people.
The documentary was called The Curse of the Blair Witch and was on the Sci-Fi Channel. Just looked it up. The website had 160 million hits which is insane considering the time.
I remember that documentary (fueling the nuts who believed the marketing as a real thing hook line and sinker)
It really was the best movie marketing of my nearly 50 years of being a movie fan, I think: can’t fathom a more effective marketing campaign
Thanks to all who commented about Snopes definitely existing at the time. I should've verified before mentioning it. Kinda makes me respect the BW marketing even more!
I had a friend in the theater who deeply wanted to stay until the end because he wanted to see the “all events are entirely fictional and any similarities…” bit and the very end
I sat there with a look at my face that I can only describe as “you gotta be kidding me” for the entirety of the credits
In your defense, Snopes may have existed but not at all like it does today. When BWP came out, the Internet wasn’t as widely accessible so no one was turning to Snopes then
They did. I saw one… right before going to see the movie. :( Kinda spoiled it, I thought it was real until that point.
Weird twist in life - that was in Montana, I now live in Maryland & know the “Blair Witch”. When Heather is running & screams “what the fuck was that”, it’s my friend chasing her.
Yup. They did. On the Sci-fi channel. Which remember, everyone didn't automatically have access to that channel because it was one of the "new" channels at the time.
I was in the 7th grade. I stayed over my grandma's house and she let me stay up late enough to catch it. Then she said "I wonder if Bruce knows about this?" Bruce is my cousin who happened to be station in Massachusetts at time 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Now that you say that, I vividly remember watching one. I can’t remember if it was before or after the movie came out. I saw the movie on a first date at my local indie theater and we both thought it was real, right up until the actors came on stage at that MTV award show.
they did! and it was masterfully done. the actors in the documentaries were so clearly, or at least seemed, not actors but real folks retelling the story.
I was only one two two in my large group of friends who went to see the film who had read the web site with the lore and the two of us were FREAKED for days afterward. I wonder if The Wayback Machine still has it.
I know how it made me feel as someone who was made to stand in corners as a kid a few times. There was an instant sense of "BEHIND YOU!!!" Maybe it was that?
That was the original idea. When they looked at the footage and what they had, they knew what we got was what worked best, so we got the 80 minutes film we know.
I was born in 1948 when new car manuals included a maintenance section that included the spark plug gap and how to set it. Today's new car manuals tell owners to not drink the antifreeze!
Same ones saying ooh only our kids did… failed to see the tiny print ‘a novel’ on Bridges of Madison County and thought that was real. We as Americans lack critical thinking skills.
It was sooooo convincing. And the “found footage” genre didn’t exist until that film so it wasn’t even a thing in the back of people’s minds. That’s what I tell myself at least
“The Poughkeepsie Tapes” is another one I stumbled on a few years ago & thought it was real, and it is MUCH creepier than BWP 🥺
Speaking of BWP, I read an article last year about how the filmmakers really did fuck w the actors to make them scared & crazy during the filming. Sleep deprivation, etc
Y2K was a blast. Tho that one I at least gave a maybe too because I think for a few things they honestly didn’t know if certain systems would work. All I know is I got my paycheck electronically put in twice on NYE & never went back to the job!! Hahaha
Yup. I've lost many friends because they became clueless and indoctrinated by Russian style disinformation & conspiracies. I lost some to the "Fake Moon Landing" lies, and some to the 911 BS, "Flat Earth" BS, and lost more friends to Qanan, Pizza-gate, and Trump's BS MAGA election fraud conspiracies
When I was a kid in the 80s, we had neighbors who regularly read The Weekly World News and all the other tabloids and didn’t see any reason not to believe them.
It was then I knew the world was full of gullible people, but it wasn’t until recently I realized how dire the situation was.
And then there was me. This isn’t real…and now everyone is calling me the Blair witch. I was 14. I also refused to watch the movie but end up seeing bits and pieces here and there.
I know. It’s scary. I hope someone has the courage to inform the American people about what’s going on in Space. We need to be made aware period. Enough of this secretive nonsense. It’s a new day politically.
It was an interesting time for sure. Before release my friend was under the impression it was real & the way he described it perturbed me, but after a bit I knew it couldn't be true. It sort of marked a time when the world was still a mystery before the internet shined a light on most things.
tbf, that movie was so terrible people probably thought "this has to be real found footage because no one would write anything this terrible to put onscreen."
I probably would have liked it better when it originally came out, but when I watched it in 2016, I found it kinda boring and annoying with the fighting in the woods.
A little disingenuous but close. This is pre-contemporary internet and before the inundation of the found-film genre in cinema. Everyone was told it was real going in and you had very few avenues with which to dispute these rumors. On first watch it was quite the experience, but obviously a fiction.
Yes, in the pre-internet era when information dissemination was not as convenient and diverse as it is now, the marketing strategy of "Blair Witch" could easily mislead the public
Which is why I included the qualifier of 'contemporary'. Part of their genius marketing campaign was a website that helped serve the film's burgeoning lore. But this was a version of the WWW that was still repped by a cute cartoon spider and hardly the bastion of info swapping that it is today.
It was pre-broadband (at least in the UK). Internet connections were still expensive and slow and tied up your phone line. Not everyone had direct access so a lot of folk were reliant on second or third hand info not always passed along accurately.
It was pre 'centralised' Internet if you get me, everything was websites with no social media, no aggregate sites etc, just random websites you'd have to visit directly, or search on alta vista haha.
I was @ RPI from 1992-1996 so remember “discovering” this stuff as a freshman. As a freshman everyone built a web page that could be viewed on their NCSA Mosaic browser on our Unix workstations. That gave way to Usenet / NNTP.
It was if you understand what is meant by the statement is really pre-modern inundation and access. In the 90s we did not have devices in hand to access and essentially live in constant contact with the internet. Many of us still couldn’t afford computers and didn’t have access.
My brother thought it was real and had his mind blown when I told him it wasn't. Even after the three stars had appeared on the MTV VMAs already by that point.
Found footage films were basically unheard of then, same with shakey cam filming. I remember people, especially young ppl in highschool assuring friends they had seen similar stuff before etc. I can believe a lot of ppl thought it was real, at least for awhile.
They didn't. At first when trailers were released, yes, but the truth slowly came out and by the time of release nearly everyone was aware it was a movie.
I was there - the bulk of people believed it was real. There are still people out there who insist it actually happened and the movie was a re-enactment.
I would have thought it was real, but a friend told me ahead of time that it wasn't. Although they did market it, as if those teens really disappeared and that footage were all they had
I’m shocked whenever I hear people say they thought it was real. I remember thinking it was fake just because they weren’t going to release real evidence into a feature film, especially when it was “unsolved.”
Yeah but you have to remember that Sci-Fi aired paranormal documentaries all the time back then so it wasn't a huge red flag. After all, SIGHTINGS aired on there.
It was actually interesting. Given that it was supposed to be the filming of a documentary, those kids didn’t do any research on the witch “legend”. The Sci Fi Channel show did.
My cousin sent me a picture of a migrant caravan about a year ago when Fox/OAN were just ramping up their planned propanda with the caption, "It's about to get real". I'm still waiting for the day when the "illegal" comes to my house with a piece of paper saying they own it now.
TBH I saw that movie on LSD in the theater when it came out. The movie wasn't as shocking as the current day waking life. I mean, my generation was watching Jerry Springer and Girls Gone Wild commercials? So...Cause and effect?
Ehh… I dunno. I think the belief element has kind of become an urban legend- much like the effect of War of the Worlds. I don’t recall many people thinking it was more than just a scary movie and even if they did, it was the equivalent of believing a ghost story without any real risk involved.
Actually, I remember feeling like an outcast because I didn't believe it. I was the weirdo because I didn't believe in ghosts. People wanted it to be true.
Interesting! Maybe the belief was in pockets? I was in high school and we saw it opening day at a just-added sold-out midnight show stuffed with young people. We were pretty spooked standing in the parking lot afterwards, but then we went home, went to bed, and returned as normal.
Oh, we're super dumb. I think we started out as naive isolationists, but once the wealthy saw how unruly we became once we all started going to college, they put the kibosh on that real quick.
How about Jade Helm 15, where the same people now winning cabinet positions were certain the annual military drill was going to to roundup conservatives and place them in subterranean FEMA camps across the south hidden underneath shuttered Walmarts? So certain of it, they activated local militia.
As a person who was around at the time, studying media and watching it in the cinema. I suspect that this is an example, of 98% of statistics being made up on the spot. 😉
My parents liked the marketing so much they raised me telling me this was a 100% true story, no different than santa claus. They even took me to a local spot with stacked rocks to say one of the witches lived there. Late 2000s, a friend pointed out the IMDB page, and I felt so betrayed lmao.
“ now Andy , did you hear about this one ?.. Tell me are you locked in the punch…? Andy are goofing on Elvis? ..Hey baby …are we loosing touch?”…..If you… belieeeeve………….”
I've never even watched it.
At least the people in 1938 who, on hearing War of the Worlds on the radio and thinking it was real, had a genuine excuse for doing so.
25 years ago it just gave us an indication who the morons were.
Funny story. Sister watched it when she was 15 or 16. Came home. Lay down in her room in the dark. AZ felt an earthquake from CA. Her bed shook. She died of fear.(Didn't really die) Good times.
"Produced on a shoestring budget, the film grossed approximately $249 million worldwide at the box office, making it one of the most financially successful independent films in history." https://www.britannica.com/topic/The-Blair-Witch-Project
I had a lengthy debate with my brother at the time, he just couldn’t grasp that it was just a movie. “But they found the footage!” he kept saying. He of coarse would later deny he fell for any of it. Trump lover too, no surprise.
Look I know there’s some things that’s happened in relation to TBW. It’s not the movie necessarily but the area and those who believe and practice other things. Yep I watched the first time at aunts house in the woods and I was freaked at 14 sure. But after a short time I knew better. And learned
after the first trailer, hubs and I looked at each other and said it’s more fun if we agree to believe it’s real even though we knew it wasn’t… happily dove into the lore and enjoyed the ride
and what was sad is the studio to build upon that belief cannonballed any career those involved may have had, it was presented as a documentary and not a creative endeavor and they also made very little money
I remember the marketing campaign for that film, first viral marketing I can remember. They had websites about the missing people, the whole shebang, it was genius! 😁
Same! I was 17. I remember seeing it with my friends then freaking out together about it afterwards. I was shocked when I found out it wasn't real during the MTV award show.
I'm guilty of initially believing the movie, was probably too young to watch it. Scared the shit outta me 🤦🏾♀️🤣. Immediately watched Deep Blue Sea right after 🤣
A not insignificant part of the math was that they had a website and a tv mockumentary special. We just didn’t know people could “lie” in those formats yet!
It was,I saw it. They were just filming, and when she attacked, they dropped it. Later we found it. messing with you 😉
Imagine a world were you know so much, but everyone else is too dumb to understand you. It's hard for me at times, but imagine how Richard Feynman felt.
“This is a real story” entertainment predates even Blair found footage. We like to be fooled! John Mandeville’s ‘travels’ in Africa/Asia (14thC), Diary of a Public Man (1864), Monmouth’s fake history of Britain (1136). Bacon’s New Atlantis (1627) also had many convinced. Lots more.
However, many people are engaging with text as if it's truth. Perhaps it's that we are now consuming converstional text, (like this), and in relation the NYT or Haaretz (or whatever) feels like gold currency?
Blair Witch Project was as stupid, thin & just plain boring as the last dry, stale, moldy piece of bread in the wrapper. Total waste of time & resources.😝❣️
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I wonder what that average is now.
https://web.archive.org/web/19990421042444/http://www.blairwitch.com/
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I was a scared kid in that theater lemme tell you
It really was the best movie marketing of my nearly 50 years of being a movie fan, I think: can’t fathom a more effective marketing campaign
The shiny newness of experiencing the "interwebs" contributed as well
Sites like snopes hadn't launched yet
It was easier to dominate web search results back then, too
Just effing genius
I sat there with a look at my face that I can only describe as “you gotta be kidding me” for the entirety of the credits
Weird twist in life - that was in Montana, I now live in Maryland & know the “Blair Witch”. When Heather is running & screams “what the fuck was that”, it’s my friend chasing her.
I still can't figure out why I was so disturbed by that standing in the corner ending. Freaky AF, but why???
The original structure of the film was supposed to be closer to Hell House LLC with interviews before the “found footage.” The original cut was 3 hrs
That Blair wasn’t really a Witch?
Such a disappointment.
Speaking of BWP, I read an article last year about how the filmmakers really did fuck w the actors to make them scared & crazy during the filming. Sleep deprivation, etc
Burkittsville, MD during the middle of the day can be a ghost town. It's eerie how often people just rent walking around there.
#WritingCommunity
Watching it at work, during the day, in a well lit room;
I could not believe how bad it actually was
It was then I knew the world was full of gullible people, but it wasn’t until recently I realized how dire the situation was.
https://youtu.be/3l2So90yoKw?si=vT3xmpY61HEtK0zj
#WarOfTheWorlds
#Radio
I was young and lived a sheltered life. My friends gave me a quick synopsis about recovered footage-and I took it at face value.
I ended up clinging to my crush and his roommate clinging to me. We walked back to their place and they lost me in a crowd briefly and freaked out.
Awwww. I was smitten.
Nothing ever happened with the guy. And that’s probably for the best
Because noone thought that was real.
It was creepy but not in a typical horror movie kinda way, so it’d be good to be certain. 😂
Time out..
IRC and BBS were also popular centralize chat services.
AOL and Prodigy also had chat rooms by the early 90s that grew fast in the mid 90s.
Thousands of separate forums and chat rooms.
Used all those things and it was nothing like social media, nothing could go viral, the word didn't even exist in that context.
I really enjoyed it. I liked that it felt real. But I thought it was pretty clear it wasn’t.
Crazy person in the woods? Ez believe
I was 9 years old.
Explains a lot.
At least the people in 1938 who, on hearing War of the Worlds on the radio and thinking it was real, had a genuine excuse for doing so.
25 years ago it just gave us an indication who the morons were.
We did think the world was going to end…
"Produced on a shoestring budget, the film grossed approximately $249 million worldwide at the box office, making it one of the most financially successful independent films in history."
https://www.britannica.com/topic/The-Blair-Witch-Project
$249 million .. in 1999
We are the black sheep in hyper dysfunctional families who were always pointing out the elephants in the room.
for a minute.
It truly was hilarious.
Imagine a world were you know so much, but everyone else is too dumb to understand you. It's hard for me at times, but imagine how Richard Feynman felt.
In fact my mother banned it in her home because she legit thought The Undertaker was a real warlock.