Trivia

(at around 46 mins) In a scene where the main actors are sleeping in a tent at night, the tent suddenly shakes violently and they all get scared. This was unscripted and the director shook the tent; the actors actually were scared.

The directors kept in touch with actors Heather Donahue, Michael C. Williams, and Joshua Leonard via walkie-talkies, to ensure the three would not become lost during their trek. Reportedly, they got lost at least three times.

It took a mere eight days to shoot this film.

To promote discord between actors, the directors deliberately gave them less food each day of shooting.

The actors were requested to interview the townspeople, who often, unbeknownst to the actors, were planted by the directors. As a result, the expressions on the actors' faces were unrehearsed.

Numerous fans were so convinced of the Blair Witch's existence that they flocked to Maryland in hopes of discovering the legend. They apparently did not read the closing credits of the film.

(at around 4 mins) The sign for Burkittsville at the beginning of the movie has been stolen three times, and it was stolen on the opening night of the movie.

To maintain the film's fear factor, the three main actors agreed to stay in character for the entire eight days of filming. Periodically, if an actor had to break from character, then the remaining two actors also had to break from character, but only after collectively reciting their safety word "taco."

(at around 53 mins) The reactions from Heather, Mike and Josh, when they discover they have walked south all day and ended up in the same spot, are real; they were genuinely upset that they had walked all day for nothing.

The actors were given no more than a 35-page outline of the mythology behind the plot, before shooting began. All lines were improvised and nearly all the events in the film were unknown to the three actors beforehand, and they were often on-camera surprises to them all.

The three principal actors, Heather Donahue, Joshua Leonard, and Michael C. Williams, shot nearly all of the completed film.

Many of the Futhark runes seen in the old house are reversed, which has a special meaning. A reversed rune implies a dark or negative fate for the person who reads them.

Heather Donahue wrote her own monologue for the initial scenes in her documentary.

Although having been given a brief crash course on using the 16mm camera, Joshua Leonard struggled to focus using it for the first few days of filming. This is why the interview with Mary Brown is of such poor focus and incredibly grainy.

One of the first theatrical features to make use of a large-scale viral marketing campaign, which claimed that the three main characters had really gone on a trip to shoot a documentary and were never seen again, save for the footage they shot being found a year after their disappearances. A website debuted on the Internet one year prior to the release, in order to set up the premise of the documentary, complete with detailed reports of the search, the recovery of the trio's footage within an old cabin, reactions from their families, and expert opinions. The three actors were instructed to refrain from making public appearances. The myth wasn't debunked until after the movie's premiere, but positive word of mouth had already popularized the movie to the extent that its success completely overshadowed that of the almost simultaneously released big-budget horror movie The Haunting (1999).

Apparently, Heather Donahue brought a knife into the forest while filming was taking place because she didn't like the idea of sleeping with two guys.

The first cut of the movie to be screened was 2.5 hours, nearly twice the final cut length.

The production company, Haxan Films, borrowed its name from Benjamin Christensen's witchcraft documentary, Häxan (1922), a source of inspiration for the film. "Häxan" (pronounced HEKS-ahn) is Swedish for "the witch".

In the initial draft, Josh was intended to have a strong romantic interest in Heather. In several of the scene instructions given to the actors on the callback auditions, it was instructed that Josh take note of how attractive Heather was, and how dejected he should be that she seemed oblivious to this. Eventually the idea was scrapped as fear the movie would become too cliché.

When promoting the film, the producers claimed it was real footage. Some people either have at one point or still believe it, or at the very least, believe that it is a re-enactment of a true story.

The real town of Burkittsville where the film is set found itself awash with fans. The town sign was stolen and desecrations in the graveyard made the mayor instigate extra police protection. The local cinema decided not to screen the film.

The slime on Josh's backpack was actually KY jelly.

Each of the three leads was required to sign a release granting the production permission to "mess with your head". Probably the most powerful example is the late-night tent attack, which none of the trio knew was coming. Their terror, confusion, and fight-or-flight responses were genuine.

The movie inspired a short-lived series of young-adult horror novels, written by an author under the name "Cade Merrill," who claimed to have been Heather's cousin and a longtime Burkittsville resident.

Despite the filmmakers had planned for Mike and Heather to be constantly antagonistic towards each other with Josh as mediator, it was Heather and Josh that fought almost constantly during the filming. The directors found it incredibly difficult to piece together a version of the movie that felt cohesive enough for the audience to believe the storyline that Heather and Josh were actually friends who would work together on a project. Director Daniel Myrick stated in an interview that at one point in particular that Josh was quite venomous towards Heather (quoting "he was really laying into her"), and that he and co-director Eduardo Sánchez (who had been observing from a distance unknown to the three) had to break the rules about not interfering with the actors to intervene before it escalated.

The first title for the movie was The Blair Witch Tapes.

Eduardo Sánchez and Daniel Myrick admitted they had to tone down some of the outbursts from Heather, Mike and Josh. They instead allowed them to accumulate in smaller doses.

Held the record for the highest-grossing independent movie of all time until October 2002, when it was surpassed by My Big Fat Greek Wedding (2002).

This film uses the word "fuck" 154 times.

The DVD version of the movie showed sections of film previously never seen on the VHS.

During the woods shooting, the actors were mostly out of contact with the directors and crew, although they were always close by. The cast was given a walkie-talkie to contact them in an emergency and a GPS device which was used to locate a pre-positioned crate, with a red bicycle safety flag attached. The crate contained instructions for the day's shoot, notes from the directors, fresh film cans as well as snacks, water, and other supplies. They deposited their day's footage in the crate so the directors could view the dailies. The crew also set up the tent for them at the next location. The directors pinged the GPS with the new location when it was time for them to move on.

The nighttime shot of Heather running through the woods (a prominent image in the trailers) had to be filmed twice because of logistical problems.

A storm moved into the area on the third day of the woods shoot, some scenes capture the downpour as they trudge through the woods. After filming, the actors returned to their campsite only to discover their tent had leaked and all of their belongings and bedding were soaked. They tried to contact the crew on their radio for help (none of the actors were permitted to carry cellphones) but they could not get a signal, possibly being out of range. Their GPS had been pre-programmed with emergency escape routes out of the woods in case they were lost (which happened thrice) and they found a nearby home which took them in. After using the homeowner's phone to contact the directors, they were picked up and taken to a local motel so they could shower and get a decent meal and a warm bed. The next day, after the crew had cleaned and dried out their camping site (as well as waterproof the tent), they resumed the shoot.

More money was spent on the movie afterwards than before its completion. The directors estimated the initial production budget of the movie to be around $20,000 and $25,000, but this rose to somewhere between $500,000 and $750,000 (over 20 times the original budget) after the studio did some additional post-production. The studio had acquired the movie rights for $1.1 million (over 40 times the original budget); they spent an additional $25 million to market it (over 1000 times the original budget). Even while taking into account these additional costs, with a worldwide box office of almost $250 million, the movie earned more than 9 times its final budget.

Although the concept of a movie consisting of people's recovered video recordings is not new (with Cannibal Holocaust (1980) as a notable early example), 'The Blair Witch Project' managed to reinvigorate the 'found footage' style of filming for several decades to come, inspiring other horror movies like Paranormal Activity (2007), REC (2007), and The Last Exorcism (2010), but also non-horror productions such as Cloverfield (2008), Chronicle (2012) and Project X (2012).

When Joshua Leonard and Heather Donahue picked up Michael C. Williams, they were originally listening to the song "We Gotta Get Out of This Place" by The Animals on the radio. However, Haxan Films couldn't get the rights to keep it in the film.

On the set of Pulp Fiction (1994) actor Bruce Willis might have predicted the success of the movie five years prior to its release "Some day in the next five years someone's gonna take one of these and make a feature film with it. They almost did it with, uh, Bob Roberts (1992). Some kid, some 17-year-old kid, is gonna make this killer, drop-dead, poorly lit video movie that is gonna be the hippest f***ing thing. And then there's gonna be hundreds of them everywhere. And they're gonna cost about... $60,000." he also suggests to director Quentin Tarantino that he be the one to create this video movie that would change the world.

The working title was "The Black Hills Project."

The house that Heather is in during the opening shot is owned by Lonnie Glerum, the film's key production assistant. He is also operating the camera during the opening shot.

The film takes place in October 1994.

Artisan Entertainment acquired the movie for just $1.1 million.

Heather seems to be filming almost constantly for the whole time they are in the woods, long after almost anyone would have stopped. Her motivation for obsessively documenting everything becomes less and less clear, and throughout the film she gets a lot of footage she couldn't reasonably expect to use even if they did manage to get out of the woods, such as her and Josh violently berating and briefly physically attacking Mike for destroying the map, and multiple instances of herself sobbing, during which she makes sure the camera is pointed at her. Mike even has to stop her from recording Josh's breakdown, and throughout the film a major source of conflict among the group is the fact that Heather just won't turn the camera off. Toward the end of the film, Josh suggests that the reason Heather is "still making her movie" is because it allows her to disassociate from the reality of the situation; the danger and hopelessness are less real if she is only watching them through a camera lens as a movie, not something which she is a part of.

Included among the "1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die", edited by Steven Schneider.

Heather Donahue was initially worried about the shoot because she worried that the directors were planning to make a snuff film.

(at around 26 mins) In one scene, Josh mentions Deliverance (1972). The film was about four businessmen who embark on a river trip in Northern Georgia, which they are soon menaced by hostile hillbillies in the local area which turns into a horrific and battle for survival in the American wilderness.

Some theories as to the true nature of the Blair Witch include that everything supernatural that happens to the trio can be rather logically explained. Case in point, the Eldritch Location of the woods, where compasses don't work and landmarks repeat themselves: A Compass can be easily fooled with powerful, natural magnets and landmarks can be convincingly faked (even a river can be diverted with some preparation). While the terror may be real, and someone's after the kids, there may be nothing supernatural involved.

The tooth necklace Josh wears through much of the film was actually lost in the woods. He asked the directors to go into the woods to try and find it, but they didn't.

(at around 46 mins) When the three are running through the woods and Heather yells, "What the f*ck is that?" at something off-camera, she is really reacting to art director Ricardo Moreno dressed in white long-johns, white stockings, and white pantyhose pulled over his head running alongside them.

Heather Donahue, Michael C. Williams, and Joshua Leonard were brought into the production under the belief that the Blair Witch was real. It was a deliberate choice by the directors not to reveal to them that the Witch legend was entirely made up. This made the interviews with local townspeople (who were all paid actors) and the harrowing events in the woods much more authentic.

(at around 24 mins) The scene with the three sitting around the campfire is probably the most expensive few seconds in the film, as the production had to get the rights for Heather to quote the Gilligan's Island (1964) theme.

Josh's car is a 1989 Dodge Daytona [G].

There was an hour and a half worth of footage shot in the hotel when the actors are getting drunk. They really are drunk by the end of the scene, and each person's real characteristics came to light. Among the footage that was cut includes Mike and Josh reciting poetry and a scene of the three at a diner. This latter scene is included on the VHS version of the film.

It bugs Eduardo Sánchez during the scenes where Josh or Mike are yelling at Heather to put down the camera so they can start hiking. It bothers him that they are in such a rush to leave, but they aren't packing up the tent or their gear. "They're not packing, because they know we're gonna come and pack it," says Daniel Myrick.

Over the course of filming, the production team left less and less food for the actors in each day's drops. Over the last two days, Heather Donahue and Michael C. Williams were down to getting a Power Bar, a piece of fruit, and water each day.

The off-camera voice heard in the opening shot of the film is Lonnie Glerum, head production assistant on the film. Likewise, this shot was filmed in Lonnie's house. The directors spent a number of weeks testing people on the crew to find the right "moron voice."

The scene at the cemetery is the only scene actually shot in Burkittsville, Maryland.

(at around 9 mins) The shot in the car of Josh complaining about meters on the camera was really actor Joshua Leonard trying to explain his inexperience with the camera. During the scene with Mary Brown you can tell he's mishandling the camera, as much of it is out of focus.

The team out in the woods making noises to scare the actors was comprised of Daniel Myrick, Eduardo Sánchez, art director Ricardo Moreno, Antonio Cora, and producer Gregg Hale. Certain sound effects were also included in post-production.

The CP-16 Josh uses in the film broke about three days into filming and had to be taken to cinematographer Neal Fredericks to be fixed. This is the same camera Fredericks would go on to sell on Ebay for $10,000.

The sounds of children outside the tent in one scene are sounds of kids who live across the street from Eduardo Sánchez's mother. Antonio Cora recorded them playing, reading, and talking gibberish. The production team had three boomboxes with this audio playing outside the tent during this scene. Michael C. Williams has said that this was his most terrifying moment during filming.

(at around 2 mins) The scene of Heather and Josh picking Mike up at his house is the only scene that was overdubbed. Heather's voice during this scene and the song were mixed in later. Mike's voice during this scene is that of Antonio Cora who did the film's score. Likewise, the song playing on the radio during filming was The Animals' "We've Gotta Get Out Of This Place," but the production could not afford the rights.

The film was originally of a much higher resolution and was degraded deliberately to look more authentic to the time it was shot.

Heather Donahue and Michael C. Williams were unaware that Joshua Leonard was going to disappear near the end of the shoot (originally Williams' character was supposed to do that). The directors had left a note for Leonard instructing him to wait for the others to fall asleep, and then leave the tent. They had to wait for 45 minutes before calling him out, telling him "you're dead." Leonard was actually glad to leave because there was a Jane's Addiction concert he wanted to go to.

The directors initially had some sort of shocking ending in mind, but when they ran out of money, they settled for the one used in the final film where Heather finds Mike standing in the corner, and then gets hit by something off-camera. Although the ending frightened test audiences, they also found it confusing, so the studio gave the directors additional budget to shoot a few alternative endings. These included Mike being hanged from a noose, having him crucified to a large stick figure, and appearing with a bloodied chest. Stick figures themselves were experimented with as decorations in the final scene. In the end, the directors were actually pretty happy with their original ending, so they shot an additional interview scene where it is explained that Rustin Parr forced one kid to stand in the corner while he was killing another, as a means to give their conclusion some explanation. Fortunately, the studio allowed them to release the movie with their original ending.

Despite the fact they never get out of the woods, civilization was rarely far away in reality. Sometimes it was just a few yards away, slightly off camera.

(at around 1h 6 mins) The teeth found by Heather near the end (supposedly Josh' teeth) were real human teeth, supplied by director Eduardo Sánchez's dentist. The hair really belonged to Joshua Leonard.

Off camera, Heather took one of the stick figures. It is later seen in pieces after they are chased from their campsite by unseen forces and is even mentioned by Josh in a later scene.

Heather and Mike were never told what to expect to find in the basement of the house at the end. Mike was instructed to run up and down stairs yelling for Josh before running to the basement, and to keep Heather as far behind him as possible. When Mike reached the basement two production assistants dressed in black grabbed him and told him to stand in the corner. When Heather arrived they also grabbed her and gently placed her 16mm on the floor while gesturing to her stop screaming. However, due to sound issues the scene had to be shot twice. Heather Donahue said the first time they did it she was so scared she was hyperventilating and had to be calmed down by the crew.

The beginning of the movie states in a title card that the students went missing and a year later the footage was found but doesn't explain where or who found it. An unreleased version of the movie started with an explanation, revealing scenes of a police investigation, a room with a table displaying all the tapes and camera equipment with evidence tags. There were also scenes showing the foundation of Rustin Parr's house where geology students had been digging and come across the footage under several layers of undisturbed soil and ash from when the house had been torched in the 40s and an expert explaining the footage could never have been placed there without disturbing and mixing the layers of ash and soil. Pirated versions of this unreleased version did circulate when the movie was still in theatres but varied slightly from the theatrical version, several interviews were missing from the Burketsville residents including the key scene revealing Rustin Parr's method of making children face the corner.

Several different endings were shot for the theatrical release, all occurring in the basement of Rustin Parr's cabin. They included two versions of Mike standing in the corner (facing backwards and forwards) surrounded by hanging stickmen, one of Mike dead and hanging from a noose, and one of Mike levitating amongst branches and stickmen. Four of these endings appear on the Blu-ray release.

(at around 50 mins) "We'll all look back on this and laugh heartily." At one point, Heather says: "If I die without ever walking across another stream on a log again, I'll die a happy girl". That is the last log-over-stream she crosses in her life.

A separate documentary-style film, Curse of the Blair Witch (1999), created by the same directors, was released as a 44 min introduction to the story and was broadcast on Sci-Fi (now SyFy) on July 11th, 1999, two weeks before Blair Witch was released in theaters by Artisan. The (fake) documentary features interviews with various experts on local folklore, local history, townspeople, scientists, academics and law enforcement, all of whom were actors, discussing the "legend of the Witch", various theories on the filmmaker's disappearance, and discovery of their film; all of which was completely fictitious. The documentary was professionally narrated and went into much deeper detail on some of the events that occur in the subsequent "found footage" movie. All of this interview/investigation footage was originally intended to be included in the theatrical release co-mingled with the "found footage" scenes shot by Heather, Mike, and Josh. Directors Eduardo Sánchez and Daniel Myrick decided they had captured enough "found footage" to use as a stand alone film without framing the story as a professionally produced documentary. They made the decision to compile all the interview footage into a separate, shorter film and present it as a real documentary which they used to preview the Blair Witch Project. Curse of the Blair Witch proved a believable, compelling, and ultimately successful marketing device for The Blair Witch Project. It is included as a DVD bonus.

MatPat from Film Theory proposed that the movie is really a (fictional) snuff film of Josh and Mike luring Heather into the woods to murder her.