Frey is the new Blair Witch?
Yes.
Let me explain.
Years ago when Blair Witch came out, it caused a huge uproar because of it's unique marketing strategy that focused on the web and kept things small, grass root. Because of that strategy, many people saw the movie believing it was real - that it was more of a documentary than a bunch of kids making a movie for kicks.
I, for one, was not one of them, unfortunately. I always wanted to know what it would've been like to watch that (especially the ending!) and think it was real the whole time.
How fucking scary.
By the time I got to see it, it had blown up and everyone knew "the truth." The sequel, it bears noting, was actually pretty good - it did a good job of coming up with a new, creative way of continuing the franchise while bringing in a fresh element to the story.
Anyway, James Frey is the new Blair Witch. I read his two books thinking they were completely factual. They were freakin' awesome. I disregarded the scattered questions popping up about the veracity of the story (before it hit the smoking gun) from random sources: author interviews, friends of junkies.
A lot of them had the same sentiment: It just didn't seem plausible to them.
Not that he spent time in jail or that he bumped over a cop. They just felt that, in their experience with addicts, someone with the type of personality like the one in the book couldn't quit like that.
I shooed off these comments saying that Frey was too intense for them, too smart, too strong.
The man's books got to me big time. It had nothing to do with addiction and more to do with style and personality. The personality in the books was incredibly powerful to me.
But now the bubble has burst and I'm now "in the know," the way I was for Blair Witch. Would I recommend someone read these books now that all this has come out? No. You won't get what I got, not even close. It's impossible to go back.
Blair Witch can still be appreciated even after you know, but these books just ring hollow now that the person in them, he who supposedly wrote the pages, no longer exists.
If you want to be entertained I suggest you go back and rent the two Blair Witch movies and enjoy them.
Let me explain.
Years ago when Blair Witch came out, it caused a huge uproar because of it's unique marketing strategy that focused on the web and kept things small, grass root. Because of that strategy, many people saw the movie believing it was real - that it was more of a documentary than a bunch of kids making a movie for kicks.
I, for one, was not one of them, unfortunately. I always wanted to know what it would've been like to watch that (especially the ending!) and think it was real the whole time.
How fucking scary.
By the time I got to see it, it had blown up and everyone knew "the truth." The sequel, it bears noting, was actually pretty good - it did a good job of coming up with a new, creative way of continuing the franchise while bringing in a fresh element to the story.
Anyway, James Frey is the new Blair Witch. I read his two books thinking they were completely factual. They were freakin' awesome. I disregarded the scattered questions popping up about the veracity of the story (before it hit the smoking gun) from random sources: author interviews, friends of junkies.
A lot of them had the same sentiment: It just didn't seem plausible to them.
Not that he spent time in jail or that he bumped over a cop. They just felt that, in their experience with addicts, someone with the type of personality like the one in the book couldn't quit like that.
I shooed off these comments saying that Frey was too intense for them, too smart, too strong.
The man's books got to me big time. It had nothing to do with addiction and more to do with style and personality. The personality in the books was incredibly powerful to me.
But now the bubble has burst and I'm now "in the know," the way I was for Blair Witch. Would I recommend someone read these books now that all this has come out? No. You won't get what I got, not even close. It's impossible to go back.
Blair Witch can still be appreciated even after you know, but these books just ring hollow now that the person in them, he who supposedly wrote the pages, no longer exists.
If you want to be entertained I suggest you go back and rent the two Blair Witch movies and enjoy them.
posted by Carlos P at 3:29 PM
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