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'It soothes me': why The Blair Witch Project is my feelgood movie
The latest in our series of writers highlighting their most rewatched comfort films is a dread-filled journey into the woods
TL;DR
- The article questions why 'The Blair Witch Project', a film depicting terror and presumed death, achieved significant box office success.
- Unlike more visceral horror films, 'Blair Witch' relies on psychological dread and the unseen, making its titular witch scarier through imagination.
- The found-footage format, combined with clever marketing, blurred the lines between reality and fiction for many viewers.
- The film's realistic portrayal of the students' descent into terror provides a compelling experience that can distract from the viewer's own anxieties.
- The author finds comfort in watching others' fictional descent into 'hell,' likening it to the comforting feeling of being safe indoors during a thunderstorm.
- This vicarious experience of fear acts as a 'vaccine against fear itself,' serving as a form of 'medicinal dread'.