Blair Witch (franchise)

Blair Witch is a horror film franchise distributed by Artisan Entertainment and produced by Haxan Films that consists of two feature films and various merchandise products. The development of the franchise's first installment, The Blair Witch Project, started in 1993. The filmmakers Eduardo Sánchez and Daniel Myrick wrote a 35-page outline of a story with the dialogue to be improvised. Filming began in 1997 and lasted mere eight days. The film followed the disappearance of three student filmmakers in the woods near Burkittsville, Maryland while shooting a documentary on the local legend known as the "Blair Witch".

After premiering at the 1999 Sundance Film Festival, the film was released on 30 July 1999 after months of publicity during a controversial promotional campaign. The film went on to be a massive commercial success, and a sequel, Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2, was released on October 27, 2000. Series of video games, books, novels and comic books were released to accompany the films.

Blair Witch (video games)

The Blair Witch video games are a trilogy of psychological horror action-adventure games (for Windows-based PCs), focusing on the backstories and the mythology of the Blair Witch film franchise. All three games use the Nocturne Engine and were published by Gathering of Developers, although each game was developed by a different team.

Blair Witch Volume 1: Rustin Parr

While Volume 1 is intended to take place within the fictional universe of the Blair Witch, the game is technically also a sequel to Nocturne, the game for which the trilogy's engine was originally developed. Elspeth "Doc" Holliday was a minor character in Nocturne, with several other characters from that game also appearing, including Master Khen Rigzin, Colonel Hapscomb, General Biggs, an unnamed secretary, Svetlana Lupescu, and The Stranger appearing at the start of the game. The Stranger reappears later in the game, on the fourth day, as the player's partner. Some enemies from Nocturne such as bat-like creatures and a werewolf also appear in the beginning of the game in the training session.

The Blair Witch Project

The Blair Witch Project is a 1999 American found footage horror film written, directed and edited by Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez and produced by Haxan Films. The film relates the fictional story of three student filmmakers (Heather Donahue, Michael C. Williams, and Joshua Leonard) who disappeared while hiking in the Black Hills near Burkittsville, Maryland in 1994 to film a documentary about a local legend known as the Blair Witch. The viewers are told the three were never seen or heard from again, although their video and sound equipment (along with most of the footage they shot) was discovered a year later and that this "recovered footage" is the film the viewer is watching.

The film received unexpected acclaim from critics and went on to gross over US$248 million worldwide, making it one of the most successful independent movies of all time. The DVD was released on Tuesday, October 26, 1999 and presented only in full-screen.

A sequel was released on October 27, 2000 titled Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2. Another sequel was planned for the following year, but did not materialize. On September 2, 2009, it was announced that Sánchez and Myrick were pitching the third film, HEART OF LOVE. A trilogy of video games based on the films was released in 2000. The Blair Witch franchise has since expanded to include various novels, dossiers, comic books and additional merchandise.