SYNOPSIS
Exiled from their settler colony, a 17th-century family hacks out a grim existence on the edge of the forest, until they come to believe a witch stalks the woods.
OPINION
If you don't like The Witch, you don't like cinema. Kubrickian in its construction, I came to believe that this is the film that would have been made had the tools and know-how been available in the 1630s; the mere notion that a witch could exist is enough to whip the characters into a fervor, but the real terror is always what happens when mental states and family bonds break down under a strict, religious, patriarchal system. With some impossibly good child acting, and perhaps the most charismatic goat of all time, the scariest part of The Witch is, simply, the original sin of being a young woman.
CAST + CREW
Director: Robert Eggers (The Lighthouse)
Cast: Anya Taylor-Joy (Morgan, Split, Radioactive)
Ralph Ineson (Shopping, The Selfish Giant)
Kate Dickie (Red Road, Prevenge, Donkeys)
CONTENT (spoilered; highlight for warnings)
violence against women, violence against children, child abduction, domestic violence
CAREER STATS [on a scale from 1 (least) to 10 (most)]
FUN: 3
No character knows a moment's peace until the end of the film.
SCARINESS: 5
The threats are uniformly internal, but no less threatening.
INTENSITY: 10
I stopped breathing several times. It simply does not relent.
RECOMMENDABILITY: 8
Hard to watch, but so rich and rewarding that it begs seeing.
SEE ALSO:
Hereditary, The Babadook, Ravenous, Kwaidan
