The horror film is hands down considered to be one of the scariest movies of all time and it’s only available to stream for free on BBC iPlayer for 16 more days.
The movie is currently available to stream on BBC iPlayer
The legend of the Blair Witch is easily one of the scariest tales to do the rounds in modern memory — and it all stemmed from a harmless horror film.
The Blair Witch Project (1999), written, directed and edited by Eduardo Sánchez and Daniel Myrick, is hands down considered to be one of the scariest documentary-style horror movies of all time.
It not only introduced the ‘found footage’ genre to horror films — seen since then in blockbuster hits like the Paranormal Activity franchise — but it’s also one of the most successful independent films of all time, originally made on a budget of $35,000–$60,000, with the final cost rising to between $200,000 and $750,000 after marketing and post-production.
The pseudo-documentary centers around three students, played by Heather Donahue, Joshua Leonard, and Michael C. Williams, who set off on a hike into the Appalachian Mountains near Maryland’s Burkittsville to film a documentary about the Blair Witch — a local urban myth of the community.
Currently available to watch for free on BBCiPlayer for the next 16 days, the legend of the fictional Blair Witch was conceived by Sánchez and Myrick in 1993. The director-editor duo developed a 35-page screenplay in which the dialogue was to be improvised. Entering production in October of 1997, principal photography of The Blair Witch Project lasted all of eight days in total.
Close to 20 hours of footage was shot for the docu-film, which was then edited and whittled down to 82 minutes. The film first premiered at midnight on January 23, 1999 at the famed Sundance Film Festival and received rousing acclaim, following which its distribution rights were acquired for $1.1million.
It eventually received a theatrical release and went on to become a sleeper hit, grossing close to a whopping $250million at the global box-office. The Blair Witch Project is consistently listed as one of the scariest movies ever, and consistently ranks as the best found footage movie of all time on several prestigious lists. However, despite the movie’s success, the three main actors of the film reportedly lived in poverty till they sued the film studio that acquired its rights, eventually reaching a settlement worth $300,000 in 2000.
With a 86 per cent critics approval rating on review aggregator site Rotten Tomatoes, the documentary-style film is widely critically lauded. One reviewer says of the film: “[The Blair Witch Project is] the most effective and unsettling horror movie in quite a long time. Just to clarify: after seeing this, you will not sleep well. Invest in a night-light.”
While another writes: “The Blair Witch Project” is the scariest movie I’ve ever seen. Not the goriest, the grossest, the weirdest, the eeriest, the sickest, the creepiest or the slimiest… Just flat out the scariest.”
A third critic has said: “No sequel or remake will ever match the power of what The Blair Witch Project managed to do a quarter of a century ago.”
While a fourth critic said: “I could tell you the story — give away every detail — and The Blair Witch Project would still freeze your blood.”
Viewers are equally impressed by the film, with one writing: “This movie is pure horror, it’s the scariest movie I have ever seen in my life, at the end, I was terrified. It all connects — the legend and the film. The Blair Witch Project is a masterpiece of pure terror, horror and suspense. Daniel Myrick is a genius!!”
Another audience review says: “Absolute classic, one of the most raw horror films out there.”
The Blair Witch Project is currently streaming for free on BBC iPlayer till November 16.
It all started with a purchase of land in the 1960s. Then, from that small slice of Utah and the founding of the Sundance Institute in 1981 and, later, its expansion into the Sundance Film Festival, Robert Redford developed a vision that would reshape on-screen storytelling as we know it. Sundance opened doors for multiple generations of filmmakers who might not otherwise have gained entry to the movie business.
Redford, who died Tuesday at age 89, was already a hugely successful actor, producer and director, having just won an Oscar for his directorial debut “Ordinary People,” when he founded the Sundance Institute as a support system for independent filmmakers. His Utah property, named after his role in “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,” would become a haven for creativity in an idyllic setting.
Evincing a rugged, hands-on attitude marked by curiosity and enthusiasm about the work, Redford embodied a philosophy for Sundance that was clear from its earliest days.
“When I started the Institute, the major studios dominated the game, which I was a part of,” Redford said to The Times via email in 2021. “I wanted to focus on the word ‘independence’ and those sidelined by the majors — supporting those sidelined by the dominant voices. To give them a voice. The intent was not to cancel or go against the studios. It wasn’t about going against the mainstream. It was about providing another avenue and more opportunity.”
The first of the Sundance Lab programs, which continue today, also launched in 1981, bringing emerging filmmakers together in the mountains to develop projects with the support of more established advisers.
The Institute would take over a small film festival in Utah, the U.S. Film Festival, for its 1985 edition and eventually rename it the Sundance Film Festival, a showcase that would go on to introduce directors such as Quentin Tarantino, Paul Thomas Anderson, Nia DaCosta, Taika Waititi, Gregg Araki, Damien Chazelle and countless others while refashioning independent filmmaking into a viable career path.
Before directing “Black Panther” and “Sinners,” Ryan Coogler went through the Sundance Lab at the beginning of his career and saw his debut feature “Fruitvale Station” premiere at Sundance in 2013 where it won both the grand jury and audience awards.
“Mr. Redford was a shining example of how to leverage success into community building, discovery, and empowerment,” Coogler said in a statement to The Times on Tuesday. “I’ll be forever grateful for what he did when he empowered and supported Michelle Satter in developing the Sundance Labs. In these trying times it hurts to lose an elder like Mr. Redford — someone who through their words, their actions and their commitment left their industry in a better place than they found it.”
Chloé Zhao’s debut feature “Songs My Brothers Taught Me” premiered at the festival in 2015 after she took the project through the labs. With her later effort “Nomadland,” Zhao would go on to become the second woman — and still the only woman of color — to win the Academy Award for directing.
“Sundance changed my life,” Zhao said in a statement on Tuesday. “I didn’t know anyone in the industry or how to get my first film made. Being accepted into the Sundance Labs was like entering a lush and nurturing garden holding my tiny fragile seedling and watching it take root and grow. It was there I found my voice, became a part of a community I still treasure deeply today.”
Satter, Sundance Institute‘s founding senior director of artist programs, was involved since the organization’s earliest days. Even from relatively humble origins, Satter could already feel there was something powerful and unique happening under Redford’s guidance.
“He made us all feel like we were part of the conversation, part of building Sundance, right from the beginning,” Satter said of Redford in a 2021 interview. “He was really interested in others’ point of view, all perspectives. At the same time, he had a real clarity of vision and what he wanted this to be.”
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For many years Redford was indeed the face of the film festival, making frequent appearances and regularly speaking at the opening press conference. Starting in 2019 he reduced his public role at the festival, in tandem with the moment he stepped back from acting.
The festival has gone through many different eras over the years, with festival directors handing off leadership from Geoffrey Gilmore to John Cooper to Tabitha Jackson and current fest director Eugene Hernandez.
The festival has also weathered changes in the industry, as streaming platforms have upended distribution models. Steven Soderbergh’s 1989 drama “sex, lies and videotape” is often cited as a key title in the industry’s discovery of the Utah event as a must-attend spot on their calendars, a place where buyers could acquire movies for distribution and scout new talent.
“Before Sundance, there wasn’t really a marketplace for new voices and independent film in the way that we know it today,” said Kent Sanderson, chief executive of Bleecker Street, which has premiered multiple films at the festival over the years. “The way Sundance supports filmmakers by giving their early works a real platform is key to the health of our business.”
Over time, Sundance became a place not only to acquire films but also to launch them, with distributors bringing films to put in front of the high number of media and industry attendees. Investors come to scope out films and filmmakers look to raise money.
“It all started with Redford having this vision of wanting to create an environment where alternative approaches to filmmaking could be supported and thrive,” said Joe Pichirallo, an arts professor at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and one of the original executives at Searchlight Pictures. “And he succeeded and it’s continuing. Even though the business is going through various changes, Sundance’s significance as a mecca for independent film is still pretty high.”
At the 2006 festival, “Little Miss Sunshine,” directed by Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, sold to Searchlight for what was then a record-setting $10.5 million. In 2021, Apple TV+ purchased Siân Heder’s “CODA” for a record-breaking $25 million. The film would go on to be the first to have premiered at Sundance to win the Oscar for best picture.
Yet the festival, the labs and the institute have remained a constant through it all, continuing to incubate fresh talent to launch to the industry.
“Redford put together basically a factory of how to do independent films,” said Tom Bernard, co-president and co-founder of Sony Pictures Classics. Over the years the company has distributed many titles that premiered at Sundance, including “Call Me by Your Name” and “Whiplash.”
“He adapted as the landscape changed,” Bernard added of the longevity of Sundance’s influence. “And as you watched the evolution to where it is today, it’s an amazing journey and an amazing feat that he did for the world of independent film. It wouldn’t be the same without him.”
Through it all, Redford balanced his roles between his own career making and starring in movies and leading Sundance. Filmmaker Allison Anders, whose 1992 film “Gas Food Lodging” was among the earliest breakout titles from the Sundance Film Festival, remembered Redford on Instagram.
“You could easily have just been the best looking guy to walk into any room and stopped there and lived off of that your whole life,” Anders wrote. “You wanted to help writers and filmmakers like me who were shut out to create characters not seen before, and you did. You could have just been handsome. But you nurtured us.”
The upcoming 2026 Sundance Film Festival in January will be the last one in its longtime home of Park City, Utah. The festival had previously announced that a tribute to Redford and his vision of the festival would be a part of that final bow, which will now carry an added emotional resonance.
Starting in 2027, the Sundance Film Festival will unspool in in Boulder, Colo. Regardless of where the event takes place, the legacy of what Robert Redford first conceived will remain.
As Redford himself said in 2021 about the founding of the Institute, “I believed in the concept and because it was just that, a concept, I expected and hoped that it would evolve over time. And happily, it has.”
The ongoing ICE sweeps taking place across Los Angeles and the country have underscored the many challenges faced by immigrant communities. For decades, migrants across Latin America have traversed rugged terrain and seas in search of a better life in the United States, often risking their lives in the process. Various films have captured the complexities of the Latino immigrant experience. Here are five of them.
“El Norte” (1983) directed by Gregory Nava
Siblings Rosa and Enrique Xuncax (played by Zaide Silvia Gutiérrez and David Villalpando, respectively) decide to flee to the U.S. after their family is killed in the Guatemalan Civil War, a government-issued massacre that decimated the country’s Maya population. After a dangerous trek through Mexico, Rosa and Enrique find themselves in Los Angeles, the land of hopes and dreams — or so they think. The 1983 narrative is the first independent film to be nominated for an Academy Award for original screenplay; it was later added to the National Film Registry in 1995.
Decades later, “El Norte” still feels prescient.
“[Everything] that the film is about is once again here with us,” Nava told The Times in January. “All of the issues that you see in the film haven’t gone away. The story of Rosa and Enrique is still the story of all these refugees that are still coming here, seeking a better life in the United States.”
“Under the Same Moon” (2007) directed by Patricia Riggen
Separated by borders, 9-year-old Carlitos (Adrián Alonso) yearns to reunite with his mother, Rosario (Kate del Castillo), who left him behind in Mexico with his ailing grandmother. After his grandmother passes, Carlitos unexpectedly flees alone to find his mother in Los Angeles, encountering harrowing scenarios as he pieces together details of her exact location. Directed by Patricia Riggen as her first full-length feature, it made its debut at Sundance Film Festival in 2007, where it received a standing ovation.
“All these people risked their lives crossing the border, leaving everything behind, for love,” says Riggen. “For love of their families who they’re going to go reach, for love of their families who they leave behind and send money to. But it always has to do with love and family.”
“Una Noche” (2012) directed by Lucy Mulloy
There is no other option but the sea for the three Cuban youths in “Una Noche” who attempt to flee their impoverished island on a raft after one of them, Raúl, is falsely accused of assaulting a tourist. Lila follows her twin brother Elio, who is best friends with Raúl, but all is tested in the 90 miles it takes to get to Miami. The 2012 drama-thriller premiered in the U.S. at the Tribeca Film Festival, where it won three top awards; its real-life actors Anailín de la Rúa de la Torre (Lila) and Javier Nuñez Florián (Elio) disappeared during the screening while in a stopover in Miami, later indicating that they were defecting.
By this time, it was not uncommon to hear of Cuban actors and sports stars defecting to the U.S.
“[Anailín and Javier] are quite whimsical and I can see how they’d decide to do something like this,” said director Lucy Mulloy when the news broke in 2012. “But this is also an important life decision, and no one in Cuba takes it lightly.”
“I’m No Longer Here” (2019) directed by Fernando Frías de la Parra
Ulises (Juan Daniel García Treviño) shines as the leader of Los Terkos, a Cholombiano subculture group in Monterrey known for their eclectic fashion and affinity for dancing and listening to slowed down cumbias. But after a misunderstanding makes him and his family the target of gang violence, he flees to New York City, where he must learn to navigate the unknown world as an individual at its fringes. The 2019 film swept Mexico’s Ariel awards upon its release and was shortlisted in the international feature film category to represent Mexico at the 93rd Academy Awards.
The contemporary film provided a nuanced perspective on the topic of migration that did not always hinge on violence.
“The idea was to have a film that is more open and has more air so that you can, as an audience, maybe see that yes, violence is part of that environment,” said director Fernando Frías de la Parra to The Times in 2021. “But so is joy and growth and other things.”
“I Carry You With Me” (2020) directed by Heidi Ewing
Iván’s (Armando Espitia) life appears at a standstill — he’s a busboy with aspirations of becoming a chef, and a single dad to his 5-year-old son who lives with his estranged ex. But his monotonous life changes when he meets Gerardo (Christian Vázquez) at a gay bar, which shifts his journey into a blooming love story that traverses borders and decades. The story is inspired by the real-life love story of New York restaurateurs Iván García and Gerardo Zabaleta, strangers-turned-friends of director Heidi Ewing, a documentary filmmaker by training. The 2020 film first premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, where it won the NEXT Innovator and Audience Awards.
Nostalgia was a crucial element for the film, a poignant feeling for those unable to return.
“Sometimes I dream about when I was a kid in Mexico and that makes my day,” said García to The Times in 2021. “That’s all we have left, to live off our memories and our dreams.”
