Winchester film festival chooses wood for horror screening (From Hampshire Chronicle)

Winchester film festival chooses wood for horror screening

7:00am Tuesday 1st June 2010 in

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IT’S the horror film that put a generation of campers off the idea of sleeping in the woods.

Three student filmmakers hike into the hills to film a documentary about a local legend known as the Blair Witch.

They go missing and a year later their disturbing video footage is recovered showing them mercilessly hunted before being murdered by a supernatural force.

Now Hampshire horror film lovers will get the opportunity to watch the American classic in a suitably scary and dark wood near in Fair Oak.

As part of the Winchester Film Festival a special bus will take 70 people to Spinney Hollow where the screening will take place at 10.30pm.

But on arrival they will have to trek for 1km through the woods before reaching a projector screen, which has been specially erected for the film showing.

Christian Francis, events manager for the Winchester Film Festival, said he hoped the screening would “freak people out”.

“I want people to be completely scared and love it, “ said the 34-year-old art administrator from Winchester University.

“When Blair Witch first came out people were scared watching it in the controlled environment of the cinema or at home. But it will be much more psychological watching it in the woods.

“The idea came from showing films with matched locations. At last year’s festival we screened the 1960s horror The Haunting at Avington Park and that worked really well. So I thought what film could we match this year? I got it into my head that The Blair Witch Project shown in the woods would be awesome.”

If that’s not enough to scare the audience rigid, a group of professional actors will also be lurking in the trees after the film has finished to frighten them as they make their way back to the bus in the early hours of the morning.

Christian added that they were planning on making the film-goers sign a disclaimer on the bus because the evening is “not for the faint hearted”.

Tickets for the event on June 12 are £3.50. Three busses will depart from the King Alfred’s Statue at 8.15pm, 8.55pm and 9.45pm. They return at 00.30am, 01.20am and 02.10am.

To book your bus ticket to the event email christian.francis@winchester.ac.uk