BLAIR WITCH 2 - BOOK OF SHADOWS

Directed by Joe Berlinger. Starring Kim Director, Jeffrey Donovan, Erica Leerhsen, Tristen Skyler, Stephen Barker Turner

There are three reasons why Blair Witch 2 needn't have been as miserably piss-poor as most horror sequels tend to be. First, its predecessor was fully deserving of further exploration; secondly, BW2 has wisely chosen to be neither sequel nor prequel; and thirdly, it employs - to almost dazzling effect - sudden flashback and flashforward rhythms, which all add up to a hugely disorienting and highly original stylistic technique.

Here, however, we come to the problem: in terms of content, Blair Witch 2 is worthless, artless and meritless to a degree which defies description. It is aimed at the ghastly teen-Yank Marilyn Manson mob, with deathly-faced adolescent poseurs ten a penny in the ranks of the film's characters - and it may well acquire a fairly rabid following among the more extreme sad-and-morbid fringe of American teendom, so closely does its script resemble a Korn lyric-sheet.

The cast, this time out, are five annoying maladjusted teen oddballs (one psychiatric patient, two students, a psychic and a new-agey Wiccan witch) who are devout fans of the original movie, and go down to the woods one day to retrace the steps of Heather and crew from last time around. Soon, for some inexplicable reason, they're not quite feeling their normal selves, what with the constant rounds of disembowelling and ritual orgies involving knives and the like.

While the first Blair Witch relied on the power of the unseen and unknown to generate fear, BW2 is as lurid and nasty as could be imagined. This doesn't marry particularly well with the film's tone - which can only be assumed to be a half-assed attempt at irony, given the prevalence of dialogue and acting unfit to litter Roger Corman's cutting-room floor.

It's unsurprising that Edouardo Sanchez and Daniel Myrick - who brought us the original - have backed well away from this project, retaining only a vague and nominal credit as executive producers. It's not merely a case of this being a disappointing follow-up. Rather, this sequel has surely relegated any future resurrections of the Blair Witch to the tossed-off straight-to-video league alongside such gems as Basketcase 2 and Wishmaster 3.