Over fifteen years have passed since the mysterious disappearance of Heather Donahue in the Black Hills Forest, but her brother James (James Allen McCune) still hasn't given up hope of finding her alive. When found video footage surfaces on YouTube showing what might be a fleeting glimpse of Heather, James leads a group of friends to Burkittsville, and into the woods supposedly inhabited by the Blair Witch.

Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2 might not have been a very good sequel, but at least it tried to do something a little different to the first film. This reboot for the Blair Witch franchise smacks of laziness and greed, the makers simply rehashing the original movie for a new generation.

This film takes advantage of the advances in technology, with digital headsets and a drone used by the characters, but director Adam Wingard is, for the most part, content to regurgitate the same old, same old: strange noises outside the tents at night, stick men suspended from the trees, piles of rocks, the characters seemingly walking in circles, and a frantic finale in a creepy old house covered in children's hand-prints.

About the only part of the film that doesn't feel tired and predictable is a claustrophobic crawl through a cramped tunnel by final girl Lisa (Callie Hernandez); after all of these years, we deserved more.

I went to see this with reservations, after the first ten minutes I thought I was going to get what I'd expected, but as it opened up I was very surprised, a film full of real scares and some truly dark moments. The first film was very unique, and also full of scares, at least until French and Saunders spoofed it that is. This long overdue follow-up built on the successes of the first and even managed to take the franchise up a notch. I felt they did a great job at not going over the top, the fact that the witch wasn't fully observed was a great idea, it helped maintain a level of suspense and allow for more in the future. The acting was good, and some great special effects, particularly those scenes set in the house. The thing in the foot scene has us all squirming as if we hadn't enough scares to deal with. Some will argue I'm sure that there were the usual horror stereotypes, but aren't they the reason we all love the genre. The latter part of the film was truly relentless, a must for horror fans. 8/10

If I never have to hear Blair Witch Project ever again in my life, I will be one happy film connoisseur. Watching these two phony documentaries together is worse than having all of your wisdom teeth pulled out on the same day, with the camera still ridiculously shaky and the premise unnecessary for a work of fiction. It's allegedly several years after the original incident and Heather Donahue's brother James gets a crew to go out with him to the same spot to try to figure out what happened to her. Purple mop haired tweens do the same amount of arguing and cursing while out there and while the filming is technically better when the camera isn't spinning around doesn't make it any more tolerable.

The only genuinely likeable member of the crew is the very intellectual black kid, and often he seems to be laughing at the others for how ridiculous they are, causing the others to gang up on them. I'll give credit to part of the photography team for some pretty nature scenes, but I genuinely didn't care about what happened to any of them let alone the fate of the original three.