Blair Witch
Lionsgate | Release Date: September 16, 2016 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
47
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 41 Critic Reviews
Positive:
12
Mixed:
21
Negative:
8
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
88
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Barry HertzSep 15, 2016
A thrill ride that’s as terrifying as it is no-nonsense. Read full review
83
HitfixDrew McWeenySep 17, 2016
The movie is as good a Blair Witch film as anyone could have faithfully delivered. Read full review
83
IndieWireBen TraversSep 11, 2016
Blair Witch is shot, constructed and executed just like the original. And the slow-build fright fest will please genre purists — perhaps enough to reinvigorate the potential franchise — even if it feels all too familiar to the rest of us. Read full review
80
Time OutMichael GingoldSep 16, 2016
Above all, Blair Witch is a triumph of sound design. The cracks, crunches and rumbles from deep in the woods enhance a terror that’s pierced only by the beam of a flashlight. Read full review
80
Total FilmMatt GlasbySep 12, 2016
Wingard and Barrett’s surprise – and surprisingly strong – sequel earns its scares. An effective follow-up to a film that can’t be matched. Read full review
75
Entertainment WeeklyKevin P. SullivanSep 15, 2016
Blair Witch is the Hollywoodication of a film that defied the industry, and it works because of the profound respect for the original that hides beneath camera work that’s too good and a cast that’s too attractive. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesBill ZweckerSep 13, 2016
Big kudos go out to screenwriter Barrett for creating a script that throws out so many curve balls. Just when you think the story is going in one direction — you get some nice jolts and surprise twists Read full review
70
The VergeBryan BishopSep 13, 2016
Wingard and Barrett add a creepy body horror element to the mix early on, and thanks to the forceful sound design there’s a greater sense of some massive, physical thing in the forest than the first film ever had — but Blair Witch is at its best when it’s honoring what has come before. Read full review
70
Screen DailyKim NewmanSep 12, 2016
It’s an intense, imaginative piece of work – which treads over familiar ground but modestly ventures a bit further in the climax. Read full review
67
The A.V. ClubA.A. Dowd Sep 14, 2016
Blair Witch will make popcorn fly. But it won’t make anyone believe. Read full review
67
The Film StageJordan RuimySep 13, 2016
It’s a film that not only goes back to the basics, but seems to deliberately steal much of what made the original such a horrific treat. Read full review
63
Charlotte ObserverLawrence ToppmanSep 24, 2016
While it doesn’t recapture the black magic of the original, it delivers the requisite terror in the last half-hour after a slow and ambiguous start. Read full review
60
CineVueBen NicholsonSep 13, 2016
It's an enjoyable jumpy imitation. Read full review
60
EmpireJonathan PileSep 13, 2016
Effectively scary and occasionally inventive, Blair Witch is a solid genre film both helped and hindered by its franchise’s place in cinematic history. Read full review
60
VarietyGuy LodgeSep 12, 2016
Setting up a number of promising kinks in the now-standard found-footage formula, as the seemingly spooked forest begins to close in its hapless victims, Blair Witch disappointingly casts most of them aside for a finale that does little to advance the series’ existing mythos. Read full review
58
The PlaylistWill AshtonSep 15, 2016
It’s an admirably well-crafted misfire, created by two of the finest filmmaking duos working together today. But perhaps that demonstrates just how singular the original remains, even to this day. Read full review
50
ReelViewsJames BerardinelliSep 22, 2016
Unfortunately, although Blair Witch owes much to the spirit of "The Blair Witch Project," it’s an inferior production. This is as much a result of stylistic and narrative choices as it is a reflection of how the horror landscape has changed in the last 17 years. Read full review
50
The Seattle TimesSoren AndersenSep 15, 2016
The characters are so thinly sketched that the audience feels little emotional investment in them, and the handheld (or rather head-mounted) cameras produce the same jittery visuals that many viewers found so off-putting in the original. Read full review
50
Philadelphia InquirerTirdad DerakhshaniSep 15, 2016
It's nothing more than a sophisticated clone of the original, and it really overdoes the shaky-camera thing - even more than in some of the worst found-footage movies The Blair Witch Project spawned. Read full review
50
Village VoiceMichael NordineSep 15, 2016
Blair Witch’s comparatively maximalist approach shows too much and scares too little. Read full review
50
Miami HeraldRene RodriguezSep 15, 2016
Falling into the trap that sinks most horror sequels, Blair Witch amps the jolts and shocks with more visceral frights (there’s some business involving an infected foot wound that is truly unnerving and also super gross) to diminishing results. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChroniclePeter HartlaubSep 15, 2016
This time, it seems as if there’s a little less magic in the woods. Read full review
50
Los Angeles TimesJustin ChangSep 15, 2016
Wingard’s movie, for all its abundant mischief, doesn’t trust the power of its own illusion. You can see these woods a lot more clearly now, and what you see is that you’ve been here before. Read full review
50
TheWrapAlonso DuraldeSep 14, 2016
Blair Witch does manage to generate occasional moments of tension, particularly when it strays from the first film’s narrative and peeks into some new dark corners. Read full review
50
Slant MagazineKeith WatsonSep 14, 2016
It doesn't suggest documentary footage found in the woods so much as a haunted-house version of Hardcore Henry. Read full review
50
RogerEbert.comBrian TallericoSep 13, 2016
What’s scarier—someone yelling boo or the sound of someone, or something, whispering it in the distance? Blair Witch has plenty of yelling, but not nearly enough that gets under your skin. Read full review
50
The Hollywood ReporterLeslie FelperinSep 12, 2016
By sticking so slavishly to the original Blair Witch film’s template, the result is a dull retread rather than a full-on reinvention, enlarging the cast numbers this time but sticking to the same basic beats. Read full review
40
The New York TimesA.O. ScottSep 15, 2016
The acting and filmmaking are too crude to make you care about what happens to any of them, even though you know pretty much exactly what that will be. Read full review
40
Arizona RepublicBill GoodykoontzSep 15, 2016
Without real innovation or story evolution, Blair Witch becomes a trip down a rabbit hole of misery and suffering. Read full review
40
Austin ChronicleMarc SavlovSep 14, 2016
It’s a fun and mostly effective ride while it lasts, part Slenderman creepypasta weird and part full-on, nerve-jangling horror, but it’s ultimately, perhaps unavoidably, unsatisfying. Read full review
40
ScreenCrushMatt SingerSep 13, 2016
Blair Witch does deliver the requisite shocks demanded of a horror movie for a multiplex audience, but maybe it’s time for filmmakers to stay out of these woods for a while — at least until there’s a new technology for the Blair Witch to mess with. Read full review
40
The TelegraphRobbie CollinSep 13, 2016
Blair Witch styles itself as a love-letter, but it’s pure transcription. Read full review
40
The GuardianBenjamin LeeSep 12, 2016
If The Blair Witch Project signalled a new dawn of horror, Blair Witch is the loud death rattle of a once exciting sub-genre, disappearing into the darkness. Read full review
38
Movie NationRoger MooreSep 16, 2016
There’s no methodical build-up to the suspense, no time to empathize with the characters, just unneeded bits of exposition the first film didn’t need to scare you to death. Read full review
38
New York PostKyle SmithSep 15, 2016
Running and screaming may be essential to a lot of horror movies, but as Blair Witch shows, they’re not scary in themselves. For that, you need the stuff between the running and screaming. Read full review
38
Boston GlobeTy BurrSep 15, 2016
The upshot is that Blair Witch comes to the party very late and very tired, and it doesn’t improve from there. Read full review
37
Washington PostMark JenkinsSep 15, 2016
Blair Witch runs only eight minutes past the original, yet it feels about a half-hour longer. The new toys — especially the drone — allow for fresh situations, and there’s more blood and supernatural affliction than before. Mostly, though, the filmmakers just repeat familiar moves and expand established locations Read full review
25
Rolling StonePeter TraversSep 16, 2016
Every attempt at fright lands with a deadening thud. For shock value, Wingard and cowriter Simon Barrett simply repeat stuff from the original film, only this time louder, lamer, duller and stupider. Scarier? That got lost in the woods with whatever you spent for a movie ticket. Read full review
25
ConsequenceMichael RoffmanSep 14, 2016
Blair Witch is disappointing on multiple levels, all of which have nothing to do with the franchise. Read full review
20
New York Daily NewsEdward DouglasSep 14, 2016
An even bigger crime is that Blair Witch isn’t particularly scary, maybe because it’s hard to take any of it seriously when it’s just treading so much similar ground as the first movie. Read full review
0
Tampa Bay TimesSteve PersallSep 15, 2016
A wheel-spinning homage gone terribly awry. Read full review
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