Daniel Myrick

After slaving years on the edges of the Industry as an award-winning video and commercial director, Daniel Myrick struck filmmaking gold as one-half of the genius behind "The Blair Witch Project" (1999). From the beginning, he and his partner Eduardo Sanchez strove for the ultimate in realism, but the secret to their success lay in trusting the results of their guerilla filmmaking and allowing it to stand by itself rather than frame it with 1940s-style newsreel and TV documentary devices as they had originally intended. "I was scared shitless to just let it go, as is," recalled Myrick in the Village Voice (July 20, 1999). "Think about it. It's Hi-8 video, as raw as you can get. Are people going to look at over 80 minutes of shaky-cam? I'm thinking, 'It'll never play in a theater.'" It was the rawness though, the amateurish home-movies feel coupled with completely naturalistic performances from the actors, that resonated with audiences and made "Blair Witch" the year's sleeper success.