Eduardo Sanchez has high praise for Adam Wingard’s Blair Witch

Last Updated on July 31, 2021

It's shocking that we didn't get more from the BLAIR WITCH franchise over the years. With the massive success of the first film and the mythology that was being crafted and built up through TV and video specials, comic books, and novels, you'd think that sequels and prequels to THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT would have been getting pumped out at frequent intervals since 1999. Instead, one poorly received sequel ran the whole thing into a brick wall and the series essentially went dormant for sixteen years. There would be occasional rumblings of another movie being planned, but it never happened.

On September 16th, YOU'RE NEXT / THE GUEST director Adam Wingard is bringing the Blair Witch back in a big way with his sequel BLAIR WITCH, a film that has the following synopsis: 

A group of college students venture into the Black Hills Forest in Maryland to uncover the mysteries surrounding the disappearance of James’ sister who many believe is connected to the legend of the Blair Witch. At first the group is hopeful, especially when a pair of locals offer to act as guides through the dark and winding woods, but as the endless night wears on, the group is visited by a menacing presence. Slowly, they begin to realize the legend is all too real and more sinister than they could have imagined.

One person who has seen BLAIR WITCH is THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT co-director Eduardo Sanchez (no surprise, since he's an executive producer on the movie alongside his BWP co-director Daniel Myrick), and Sanchez has very high praise for what Wingard has done within the series he helped create.

While making a guest appearance on Boss Butcher and Michael Steinberg's podcast Found Footage Files, Sanchez said that BLAIR WITCH takes THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT and "turns it up to 11".

It's just full-blast Blair Witch. It's really creepy and the last third is just crazy. It's just all over the place. It just does not let you go, you know? I'm really happy to have been a part of it… it kind of progresses the found footage genre a little bit which I think is really cool. …

It's really, really well grounded in the original. And I think that the fans of the original will get a lot out of it. It's kind of a recognizable…it's almost like you've been, like kind of a deja vu, but then it turns into just a — like I said, it kinda takes our film and blows the doors off and goes nuts with it, in a really really good way."

Sounds like Wingard and screenwriter Simon Barrett have delivered exactly the sort of BLAIR WITCH movie the series needs after taking sixteen years off.