The Blair Witch Project is a 1999 American found footage supernatural psychological horror film written, directed and edited by Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez. The film tells the fictional story of three student filmmakers (Heather Donahue, Michael C. Williams and Joshua Leonard) who hike in the Black Hills near Burkittsville, Maryland in 1994 to film a documentary about a local legend known as the Blair Witch. The three disappear, but their video and sound equipment (along with most of the footage they shot) is discovered a year later; the "recovered footage" is the film the viewer is watching.
While the film received unexpected acclaim from critics, audience reception was polarized. It became a resounding box office success, grossing over US$248 million worldwide, making it one of the most successful independent films of all time. The DVD was released on October 26, 1999, and a Blu-ray edition was released on October 5, 2010.
A sequel was released on October 27, 2000 entitled 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. 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.
On July 22, 2016, an official trailer for a sequel to the film, directed by Adam Wingard and entitled Blair Witch, was released at San Diego Comic-Con. The film, produced by Lionsgate, was released on September 16, 2016. Blair Witch is a direct sequel to The Blair Witch Project, and does not acknowledge the events of Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2. However, Wingard has said that although Blair Witch does not reference any of the events that transpired in Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2, the film does not necessarily discredit the existence of Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2.
