So everyone’s talking about how mad The Witch made us, the American moviegoing dum-dum, and it did make me mad, and I am one of those dum-dums, and I am not going to let the conversation turn into “why can’t these audiences desperate for gore and mindless knife-thrusting sit back and enjoy a really period-accurate movie about people saying “thee” to each other and shucking rotted corn for like seven hours?” Not on my fucking watch, pal.
A of all, I’ve seen The White Ribbon and The Babadook, so you’re not going to get me to feel bad about my dumb lizard-brain; I get that not all horror movies are going to be Black Christmas or Mannequin or Martyrs and I don’t even want them to be! What I do want them to have: SOME HORROR.
Here’s what I will concede is boss as hell about The Witch
- the trailer
- the woods
- those creepy stalks of corn in their garden
- that bananas scene where the raven is like pluck-plucking its beak on the mom’s breast and it’s like that super-freaky tableau of THE DEVIL’S BREASTFEEDING, that got me but good
- my friend Jos said afterwards that it wasn’t a raven, it was a crow (or vice versa, my friend Jos says a lot of things and I don’t always pay attention, not because he’s not interesting but because I’m not always interested in learning things, which is really more about me than it is about him) and he said something like “if it’s by itself, it’s a raven; if it’s in a flock, it’s a crow,” by which he meant that one is solitary and one travels in packs but which I took to mean as “a raven by itself will turn into a crow if it meets another raven” which I thought was really fascinating until he gently corrected me, I should really listen to Jos more
- They definitely all acted up a storm, especially the dad and the little dude who played Caleb, they were for sure Acting the hell up and I respect that
- END OF LIST
I don’t know, man, there were some really great moments in the movie but they were punctuated by eight hours of just filming the back of some kid’s head and a lot of dialogue that felt like it was super impressed with itself. “Tither gone the mickle prayn’t, Motherling?” Like, yes, those words are VERY old, okay??
Here’s my real problem: there is about four minutes all told of the blood-milk and the creepy baby-smashing and in between there’s just not a lot going on. Like, at one point the dad says “We have no crops! We’re definitely not going to last the winter,” and it would be great, at that point, to start seeing some consequences of what he just said, but nope, next scene they’re at dinner and we literally never see them go hungry. I WANNA SEE EM GET GAUNT AND WORRIED. Give me some consequences! Like: the horse goes missing and they lose all the animals they trapped, but everyone’s dead before they get a chance to miss them. Let ’em swing before you cut ’em down, The Witch!
I also super appreciated that they had the baby disappear within the first five minutes, rad choice, but then follow it up with some creepy shit! You have a farm full of animals and none of them mysteriously dies! A field full of creepy-ass corn stalks and none of them get rearranged in a freaky-ass pattern or like, I dunno, hides a hornet’s nest in it, only the hornets are more witches. Look, I’m not a writer. I just like slow but steady escalation of the stakes in my scary movies.
I also REFUSE TO BELIEVE what this movie asks of us, which is that after like [checks watch] three weeks in the woods, ten-year-old Caleb (he’s MAYBE eleven, but he’s definitely ten) is already surreptitiously (heh) checking out his older sister’s rack of breasts? That is SO FAST! I feel like you need to establish a longer pattern of isolation before some little dude is like, “Welp, time to gaze upon the breasts of my sister, verily and sirrah.”
Other problems include:
- So the devil at the end asks Thomasin if she wants to “live deliciously” and promises her butter dresses and world travel, but look at what he has actually handed out to the previous witches: a shitty hut alone in the woods and nothing! This is a piece of shit deal, man!
- Also, like, if you are going to try and ramp up the religious paranoia, which, fine, don’t make it immediately clear that the witch is mega-real! There is literally zero ambiguity about witches throughout the movie, just like, yep, fuckin’ witch out there, she wanted one (1) baby but doesn’t even turn up to see her handiwork at the end of the movie when everyone’s goat-murdered and face-split to death? Okay, bub, that’s like missing Witch Graduation
- That little girl was a bitch. I don’t have anything else to say about it. She was just a real bitch.
- Oh, the rabbits were freaky, I’ll give you that. Definitely a freaky rabbit.
- So many close-ups of the back of everyone’s head! AND YET: it never paid off? Everyone’s head was always the same.
- Man, I GET IT, okay, the movie’s very like, “whoa, what if puberty were DANGEROUS, what if young women’s bodies were THREATENING, whoa whoa WHOA,” which is fine and basically what’s kept the genre alive and also kind of what gave us Gingersnaps, but like, it is VERY ON THE NOSE and I can handle ON THE NOSE if you also scare me (and I am not hard to scare! Signs scared me a few times!)
- HAVE THE MOM GO BANANAS AND TRY TO KILL EVERYBODY SOONER. HAVE THE GOAT DO CREEPY THINGS EARLIER. MAKE SOMETHING HAPPEN RESEMBLING ANY THING. It’s just super-loud violins and not enough super-loud violence, is what I’m saying now and also what I said last night to my friend Jos outside the theater, and he sort of chuckled but I really wanted a bigger laugh so I’m trying that line out again now, even though I pretty much cribbed it from Roseanne Roseannadanna
In conclusion, don’t let anyone make you feel dumb because you didn’t enjoy a lot of people from East Yorkshire moaning about Calvinism for thirty hours before a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it bloodbath. And I love Calvinism! There are great-ass scary movies to be made about religious paranoia (MARTYRS FOR INSTANCE) and also isolation (END OF THE LINE, THE THING) that still know how to effectively raise the stakes and establish a real sense of danger!
P.S. Miss me with that “is it FEMINIST” nonsense? All we know that witches do in this universe is actually smash up babies and make out with twelve-year-olds to death, so, I don’t see how that’s in any way better than Thomasin’s life before, which was mostly about working on a farm, I know we are solidly against Puritans in These Modern Times, but they did not establish that her life before was so shitty that her cool new witch life is going to be fun, it pretty much looked like the Michigan Womyn’s Festival, which I have never once been tempted to attend (N.B. If I am really honest with myself, Jos got off that Michigan Womyn’s Festival line, and I was pretty mad because it was better than my violence/violins line, but he deserves the real joke credit here. Sorry, Jos. You’re right about crows and you were really nice about my stealing your joke, which of course made me feel worse. Okay back to the movie). Like: her parents were PRETTY TENDER with one another before all their children started dying. She misses windows and England, okay, that’s fine, not a super easy motive to identify with, but okay.
P.P.S. SOME REAL MORE MISSED OPPORTUNITIES HERE. Like, these dudes are clearly familiar with all those Goya and Falero paintings and could have set up so many more creepy and demonic-looking tableaux and just entirely didn’t. “Visually, let’s just go with another shot of corn.” Okay. I gotta go kick some air, I’m still mad, guys.
“Look, I’m not a writer.” LIES UPON LIES THEE GOODY ORTBERG
I’m glad I’m not the only who’s brain went there
Now that I have all the spoilers I think I am going to watch this horror movie (“horror” movie?) even though the last one I watched was The Ring and FUCK YOU THE RING.
My thoughts exactly! Except then I remembered that actually I watched Cabin In The Woods (as in, the Joss Whedon satire horror movie) sooner than that, and THAT gave me nightmares. So maybe I won’t watch it after all.
THE RING CAN FUCK RIGHT OFF.
I just laughed out loud at this, thank you
(also wonderful moniker or whatever they are called)
I watched The Ring at my friend’s house and then slept on his couch afterwards, and in the middle of the night I woke up and our other friend who has asthma was BREATHING HEAVILY AND WALKING TOWARDS ME FROM IN FRONT OF THE TV.
It was not ok.
THANK YOU. I saw a screener months ago and have been dying to talk about this movie with someone.
I just keep saying: if you think The Wicker Man (original flavor) has a happy ending, this movie is a disappointment.
I kinda loved the original Wicker Man, cheesiness and all.
I love it too! It was required viewing at my college pagan group’s annual Beltane retreat. (Only ever watch the directors cut! The theatrical makes no sense.) But I am totally pro-Lord Summerisle. They gave Howie a chance, all he had to do was bang the innkeeper’s daughter and he would have been fine, the rest of the movie is on him.
Haaaa I watched it because I was Pagan, too. I think if you were Pagan/Wiccan of a certain era it was nearly required!
So glad to see others have this response. I showed the movie to a class I taught lo these many years ago on “Celtic paganism” and was truly shocked that everyone in the class said that they were totally pro-Summerislers until they torched Howie. I was like, “But he’s practically saying the words out loud: ‘please, sir, may I be a Christian martyr’! It’s a win-win for everyone!”
I’ll also add that no-one ever seems to pick up on the fact that Summerisle’s grandfather essentially created the islanders’ paganism by reading The Golden Bough, which I find hilarious.
That nekkid bedroom walldancing, I have seen nothing to rival its wanton weirdness!
Britt Ekland was pregnant during the shoot, and so supposedly, they sneaked in a body double for the back-view full-body nekkid dancing shots. Ms Ekland was not best pleased.
can we all agree the twins were weird looking, like their faces didn’t seem right and their gums were too big
In their tiny adult clothes, talking like adults
Those twins were freaky as fuck
their teeth were too far apart
They looked like they had been living in an attic somewhere for their entire childhood
The twins were probably the most horrifying part, yes. (Though I will admit I liked the movie & its creepy Calvinism, on the nose or no.)
That shit where they couldn’t pray and went unconscious for a good couple of hours? Completely terrifying tiny kid characters.
Will end up seeing this regardless, despite my living in the depths of New England. In the woods. In the fog. Amongst the moldering vegetation. Beplagued by ravens. With some honest to god slow burn creepiness at my parents’ farmhouse. Like five years of slow burn creepy. Apparently the things in the woods like taking their own sweet time.
…not that I’m in any hurry for the bloodbath, but I’m getting sick of vague ominous feelings every time I’m there. Also the back of everyone’s heads.
I was in sixth grade when The Blair Witch Project came out. I grew up two miles back in the woods. RECKLESS FOOL that I was, I rented it from Blockbuster, then waited until it got dark to watch it.
I spent the next three years going down to the barn every night to let the horses out (we didn’t have lights back then), clutching my flashlight, chanting to myself, “There is no Blair Witch. There is no Blair Witch. There is no Blair Witch.”
Am with you…spent much time tramping the backwoods of the Maritimes looking for old homesteads/abandoned farms. Not a lot of standing buildings, but an overgrown cemetery in the middle of the woods where a desperate group of unpopular settlers failed to farm until they starved/were burn-out/forced to indenture themselves in town? That place is creepy in late fall when the wind howls and sunset happens before the end of your workday.
I saw The Witch with my bestie, at a late night showing in Texas (Work trip FTW!) and I was kinda…let down? Not air-kicking mad, but more sad that they didn’t seem to know what to do with the movie.
There were freakier things (and scarier things) in the Alamo’s pre-film witchery super-cut than in the movie itself.
I mean, either go full-bore horror or ratchet up the atmosphere and make it entirely about a family tearing itself apart out of pure paranoia. Keep the blink-and-he’s-missing baby and the failing crops and the weird animals but skip actual witch/devil nonsense altogether. I somehow think that would have worked better?
It was also weird watching it after having read Stacy Schiff’s The Witches recently. That book is all questions and no firm answers and took a lot of stick for it in reviews (unfairly, I think). This movie’s answers were too darn glib.
Essentially, it is no Babadook, which is the movie that scared me the most (and for the longest time afterward) of any movie in thirty plus years. I haven’t been so scared since watching Poltergeist at age 12 – and that movie made me bury my baby sister’s clown doll in the woods for some protective pre-teen reason.
Did you get the drafthouse Witch-inspired tart?! I know I’ve been selling that tart hardcore on the Toast dot net but it was SO GOOD. Goat cheese! Raspberry!
Nooooo! I didn’t notice it on the menu! But I did have 2 brown sugar lemonades, which are amazing every time.
Yes! This movie got caught very ‘twixt and ‘tween. It wanted to be a cautionary tale about a family’s irrational religious hysteria leading to infighting and disintegration, but it was actually a story about a malevolent outside force destroying a family that really never had a chance.
Honestly, I ended up feeling like the Dad did a decent job (after he stopped letting his daughter take the blame for the cup and the woods-leading and whatnot), because he didn’t really want to believe his kids were witches and decided to deal with it by letting everyone just cool down before they went to get some help. But I don’t think the movie wanted me to think the Dad was a pretty good dude; I think it wanted me to think he was a scary zealot. Doesn’t really work when his fears are shown to be totally justified!
“Puritans are super-paranoid about witches because they’re dicks who hate women.”
*actual-factual witch in the woods starts killing and fucking with everyone*
“Yup, irrational, misogynistic paranoia.”
THIS. SO THIS.
I couldn’t bring myself to watch it because it makes me SO ALL CAPS ANGRY that there is a movie justifying patriarchal religious dudebros being dicks to women, what with the women being deserving of their scorn and suspicion and being tortured to death. NO.
And hey, people have made that movie before, they’ll make it again, it’s almost to the point where you can tune it out as patriarchal white noise in order to enjoy a movie about people getting murdered in the dark and spooky woods by the agent of Goat Satan. But my dudes, if you’re going to make that movie, make that movie. You don’t also get to score forward-thinking points by simultaneously making a movie about how the patriarchy demonizes female sexuality and controls women through fear and paranoia. You have to pick one of those messages.
And again, here you are with being all the accurate.
Lack of clarity from overly ambitious directors is a little problematic. I think it comes from him coming from the direction of art production on films as opposing to writing/producing. They tend to want to throw in everything and the kitchen sink, and things get thematically muddled. That’s being generous though – my kneejerk reaction to the director’s choices here was, “you dumbass. ”
I really want to go with tuning out patriarchal white noise because it looked moody and spooky and cool, and bonus points for how New England woods, lack of plumbing and electricity, constant fear of everyone around you, and goats are all legit unnerving. it was pretty trailer! But I just cannot get past the fact that just, you know, being female was a straight up psychological thriller in Puritan New England. Maybe I am oversensitive. I honestly don’t know.
The Babadook!! I have so much love for that movie. That comparison makes me realize how actually un-rooted in character The Witch was. I was so taken with Black Phillip’s charismatic goat-dances in the immediate aftermath of watching that it took me a minute to realize this movie was not really a horror movie or even a modern take on this sort of morality tale / fable at all, more like.. what if instead of witch legends being rooted in restrictive religious doctrine and demonization of women, they were just.. REAL?? And that’s it. It doesn’t seem to want to take this premise very far into commentary on the effect this would have on women’s lives, just remain content to portray real-life witches terrorizing God-fearing people in Puritan times. Which is cool. It just doesn’t stand up to any kind of analysis, feminist or otherwise.
The “missing windows and England” part is a good point– I think it was meant to be a vague hint about Thomasin longing for the finer things in life, but I didn’t get a sense that she was any more discontented with their life than anyone else in the family. She really doesn’t get many character moments so it’s hard to see why she would be like “yes, butter, yes, dresses” at the end, other than just not wanting to die, since she has no defenses left against the devil at that point. It’s not much of a choice at all for her.
I am intrigued by this The Witches book. Will put it on my list, thanks for the rec!
“Rack of breasts”
Coming here to say the same thing.
The IMAGE. I just keep picturing the sister carrying around a wooden rack full of various breasts like a carillon of bells, or a spice rack, or something.
Or maybe like antlers. Any formulation is equally hilarious!
I’m picturing what is essentially a crown rib roast, only somehow there are breasts.
SAME
I thought it was great, maybe I’m a pretentious boy but I loved that it put character and culture and subtlety over putting a lot of creepy junk. I love creepy junk but it is risky cuz it can be really dumb and the witch studiously avoids being dumb IMO. This is a churlish thing to say but expectations are important and I somehow had the expectation it would be tasteful and restrained and was not disappointed.
(pretty sure that anyone who says churlish is actually a witch)
Not familiar with this trope but can’t confirm or deny the allegation
What are you saying, this movie wasn’t churlish enough for me and my fellow churls? Pfft, I love me minimalist horror. Like It Follows or The Blair Witch or In Abstentia. What I hate are all these people who clearly hate the horror genre coming in and cooing over a super unscary flick because some guy cobbled together disjointed old timely quotes. The woods are not inherently scary. This dude just flat out shot some Canadian woods on a cloudy day. Trees are not scary just standing there being trees.
Nope sorry, lost me at “baby is taken within the first five minutes” NOPE
Wimps w/r/t babies in peril unite! (I am a delicate buttercup about horror in general though, why am I even reading this article?)
Ever since I became a parent, I can’t handle kids in danger in books/tv/film at all. Like, I threw The Hunger Games across the house because of Rue.
Yup. Absolutely. Totally agree. +1.
See also: _Room._
Take all the babies, save the dogs…
I am a monster human.
It me. Violence against animals (especially dogs) is way harder for me to take in horror than violence against any type of human, itty bitty ones included.
I feel this way about any movie in which the parents die in the early scenes. I’m looking at YOU, Every Disney Cartoon Ever.
Yeah I am kind of embarrassed at how having a baby has made me completely unable to handle depictions of babies in danger (even worse if it’s REAL and in the news, but fictional also). Am I really that much of a cliche? Evidently I am.
I had been intrigued by this when I saw the preview. Thank you for seeing it so that I can read your rage and not have to feel my own.
I’m seeing this with a coven of fellow-lesbians tomorrow and am greatly looking forward to discussions of the feminine as horrific.
If anything, it does sound very useful as a conversational kickstarter on various aspects of the patriarchy! Always a good time.
between the raven/crow explanation and the phrase “a coven of lesbians” i’m learning all kind of fun pluralizations today!
“A privilege of cishet white dudes”
Win.
I always figured the best defense when accused of witchcraft would be, “Have you seen where I live? Don’t you think I’d be able to afford better than this dump if I had some sort of deal with Satan?”
“Do I look as if I’ve grown fat on the blood of human children?”
“On second thought don’t answer that.”
Signs WAS scary at times. Like the reveal of the alien on television, or that scene where Joaquin Phoenix’s character almost enlisted to escape the economic and social doldrums of small town Pennsylvania.
Jos is wrong about crows and ravens, so feel good about your disinclination to learn about corvids from him, Mallory.
wait really?? what’s the truth about em??
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=guBwMUAWAJI
Ravens just rock.
A raven is big and has an angled beak (akin to an aquiline nose in a human). They are more intelligent and solitary than crows.
A crow is smaller and has a straighter beak. Less intelligent, less self-enclosed, and less menacing than a raven.
Crow: Hugh Jackman
Raven: Alan Rickman
Crows may be less intelligent than ravens, but they are still preeeetty intelligent. They can recognize faces, and they understand analogies and can problem solve, just to start. http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/crows-u…
(covers mouth with hand) FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!
(pushes up the sleeves of her sweater, gets mad when they start to inch back down, decides she’d rather fight her sweater, but still yells “ANYWAY I’M RIGHT ABOUT THIS”)
I will say that I find ravens to be infinitely less creepy-looking than crows (with of course the grackle being the creepiest). I actually think ravens are kind of pretty.
Ravens are pretty! But crows are cute. (they are wild animals and the things they do aren’t always cute.)
I notice you did not stick up for grackles, or as we call them, “sky rats.”
Yes, you are correct that the grackle holds no place in my heart. I don’t have any malice toward it the way I do for starlings and other invasive pests, but it’s not on my birdie friends list.
Ps I’m putting this here because I have to share it and I have nowhere else to do so: two weeks ago as I was walking to the grocery store a hundred-strong flock of Sandhill Cranes flew directly over head, and not more than 10 stories up. It was awesome in its original meaning.
Pps oh my goodness the Audobon people tell you to “stay abreast” of news by signing up for their newsletter. I should have know the Audobon Society was full of Dads.
This comment thread is one of the best things published on The Toast.
I’m having the best time rereading it now…
Ravens look at you the same way raccoons look at you. They just sit on your recycling bins with that stare that says “You ain’t about to do nothing about this and we both know it.”
And they’re right. I am only the dominant species theoretically. I would not fight a large bird.
I 100% agree with your entire comment
Oh, the stares of ravens. Cats and feral teenagers got nothing on ’em. They are simultaneously fascinated by and contemptuous of every thing humans do.
And ravens do congregate! Not in the family-reunion way of crows, more like some pals going out to surf thermal currents together or a coven gathering or a small, dour, yet curious conference of insurance inspectors at the scene of a disaster.
The ones that hang out near my house will break off their thermal-riding to swoop down and try to pull the hair on my dog’s tail…there is a trail along the bluff edge and they LOVE to tease any dogs that walk by…late summer, fall, all winter and early spring…they are gone all summer, being secretive so no one will find their nests and babies. Most entertaining neighbours I have ever had!
Check out the ravenmaster. https://twitter.com/ravenmaster1?ref_src=twsrc%5E…
(Whom I discovered in yesterday’s link roundup, so no credit to me.)
Is he? I’ve always thought that one easy distinction is that crows will be all “hey buddyyy” to every other crow, but ravens like to hang out solo (because all of their friends are invisible, and named Death).
Mallory, I realize this is jokey and hyperbolic, but you nailed all the problems I had with this movie.
Like yes, escalate the tension; yes, don’t let all the air out of your “family tearing itself through irrational religious hysteria” theme by immediately establishing that their religious hysteria is completely rational, because witches are real; and yes, absolutely let the family twist in the wind a while before destroying them, because the way this movie did it, none of their internal conflict ended up mattering anyway. Did it ever seem like if the family just stuck together, they could have saved themselves from the witch, thus lending their infighting an air of tragic irony? Fuck no, it was obvious from the beginning that the witch was gonna kill ’em all, then she did, the end.
But pros: the music was real creepy, and I thought the sets and costumes looked super authentic to me, a person who knows almost nothing about Puritan Times.
But even the creepy music wasn’t appropriately creepy. The movie wanted me to be really scared of trees for some reason.
So, in the event of impending malevolent witchery, should you go for religious hysteria, or scrupulously avoid it? Seems this movie is ambiguous.
I mean, why bother to see movies unless they give answers to the everyday problems we all face.
So I will never see this movie because horror is not for me, but I did just read the wikipedia summary, and despite all of the terrible things that happen, the fact that the summary includes a link to the real live wikipedia article on WITCHES FLYING OINTMENT (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_ointment)!? I’m just really that that article exists.
“I know we are solidly against Puritans in These Modern Times”
BUT THE PURITANS WERE BONKERS IN THE MOST FASCINATING WAYS AND KIND OF WEIRDLY PROGRESSIVE IN THEIR APPROACHES TO GOVERNANCE* AND LITERACY. And also when people say this about puritanism or people being ~puritanical~ about sex or whatnot, they almost always actually mean the Victorians?
Anyway, if anyone is interested in my “John Calvin is actually a really interesting guy” rant, I’m here for you.
*At least in theory, I know my Cromwell and yeah, they botched the whole… Interregnum thing. But the American Puritans! They were into banning dancing and whatnot, but they also kind of came up with a bunch of ideas about proto-democracy? And Puritan ideas about the individual’s capacity to interpret religious text are really cool! Congregational control of churches was a radical concept!
And even the Victorians weren’t THAT anti-sex.
But seriously, if you have any mass-market books on the Puritans I’d love to have’em. I’ve already read The Wordy Shipmates.
This isn’t about the Puritans per se, but Marilynn Robinson’s “The Death of Adam” is a FABULOUS book. Several of her essays concern the legacy of Calvinism in America and it’s really, really interesting. http://www.amazon.com/The-Death-Adam-Essays-Thoug…
And if you finish and enjoy that, you’ll be pleased to discover that at least 80% of Marilynne Robinson’s other essays are also about the greatness of the legacy of Calvinism in America (not a complaint, somehow!).
My stereotype of Puritans was destroyed in Early American lit when we learned about Edward Taylor, a conservative/orthodox Puritan minister whose religious poetry was centered around images of sex, shit, and possibly sexy shitting (but don’t quite me on that last one).
Bundling still blows my mind.
I totally came to comment the same thing! One of the best facts I learned working for a historic (Anglican) church in Massachusetts was that the Puritans thought orgasm (for both parties) was essential for pregnancy. So women would complain about not getting pregnant because her husband wasn’t fulfilling his end of the deal, so to speak. 😉 I once brought that up at a family dinner party because my uncle was being a pretentious douche and I wanted to prove I was a better historian than him while making everyone uncomfortable. (Highly successful, would recommend)
That belief goes back to the Middle Ages, at least. It’s based on the idea that female genitalia is basically outside-in male genitalia (which is true-ish) so female orgasm was the same as male ejaculation. (So pregnancy was considered evidence that a woman had ‘enjoyed’ rape because history sucks and we can never had nice things).
Is anyone else missing the end of the last paragraph? “…establish a real sense of…? Of what? I must know!
Mallory is cleverly making her point about establishing suspense and tension by leaving us in suspense about the rest of that sentence.
There it is…”danger”!
Honestly, just give me creepy stalks of corn and I’m SOLD. (As long as Mel Gibson is not involved).
There were so many different directions this movie could have gone, instead of the completely directionless one they chose.
1. MAKE IT ABOUT THE WITCH. Don’t let it just be a clever name, focus on that creepy, naked monster. I liked her! Seemed like there was a lot to work with there.
2. More twins! More Black Philip in goat form! Their crazy goat whispering was the best part for me. I may or may not have gone home and attempted to conjure all of my pets to spaketh to me.
3. Let that crazy mom do her thing. Kate Dickie is fantastic, and the dynamic with her and Thomasin after the baby disappeared would have made for a very scary movie.
4. Just show the true horror of how hard they would have worked all day, and how depressed they must have been allllllllllllll the time. They lost me within the first 15 minutes when their house and outbuildings had seemingly sprung up overnight.
It WAS about the witch, because the titular witch is Thomasin in the end.
Awwww I wanted to see this. Maybe not so much now.
Also I’m with you on the easily-scared bit. I legit SHRIEKED multiple times during Signs. But I also have mild phobias for 1. aliens 2. ominous things you can’t see, so really, it may as well have said “April will find this so frightening she’s gonna sleep with the lights on for two weeks” on the poster.
If you wanted to see it, go see it! I love Mallory Ortberg but I disagree 100% on basically all counts here.
I also disagree with Mallory here and I didn’t even LOVE the movie–I just thought it was worth seeing. Though I do think it’s good to go in with slightly tempered expectations re: the horror. A friend described it as a “horrifying drama” rather than a horror movie and I think that’s more accurate.
So basically, you should see it!!
See I largely agree with Mallory in that I can see and concede all points, but also on the whole liked the movie. Glad I saw it. Would recommend. But also would have enjoyed a version where all the movie was more like the last 20 minutes more.
I’m 100% never going to see this film because there’s a special section of my brain dedicated to NEVER FORGETTING scary stuff I’ve seen and periodically bringing it out at 3am for a surprise airing. BUT. Something I have never understood about movies/tv and maybe someone smart can explain to me:
That thing where a monster is an obvious and sympathetic stand in for a minority (‘God hates Fangs’), but then they’re actually kind of evil so the (NO GOOD VILLAIN) people hunting them kinda have a point. There wasn’t a vampire in True Blood that hadn’t done at least one murder. ?????????
I kinda always viewed true blood as being “what if vampires were real in the current American cultural climate?” (Ie. A culture where there’s fanatic religious groups protesting anything and everything, plus gun culture and the general violence issues). And less them being an actual stand in for LGBTI – because there are still LGBTI people in the show too.
Lol totally relate to your brain going “hey its 3am let’s think about some scary movies that scared the pants off you! Have fun”. I avoid horror for this reason.
Me too on the not forgetting. Plus I get scared really easily. When my dad and I went to see the Maltese Falcon last weekend, they had some kind of promo thing beforehand that referenced the Shining, and my dad was like, “that movie wasn’t that scary, I don’t get it,” and I had to stop myself from reflexively shouting in the middle of the theater “WELL IT WAS SCARY TO ME.” I still think about that movie and I saw it yeeears ago.
And even when there is a miracle and I don’t Freak Out at the scary movie, my brain still wakes me up with a solid “sooooo you know how that wasn’t so bad? What if we changed it here here and here? That’s MUCH SCARIER right?”
Good work brain.
I have some horror-related jerkbrain issues as well. It is no bueno. In particular, I get the cold sweats if I have to turn on a light in the kitchen or open the refrigerator in the middle of the night because THANKS 28 DAYS LATER. (That’s facetious. I am not grateful at all. Not even a little. I am braced for zombies every time I have to fix the baby a bottle in the middle of the damn night.)
“So many close-ups of the back of everyone’s head! AND YET: it never paid off? Everyone’s head was always the same.”
I’d like Mallory to review all movies in this vein, and also narrate real life, docking points from passers-by for having uninspiring, pedestrian heads.
Caleb did have some distinguishing freckles at least.
Not having seen this movie (and lacking critical thinking skills today, apparently), I thought you were trying to tell me there was a scene with ravens and bananas pecking a woman. Actual, literal bananas.
Would watch.
THANK YOU. I was actively rooting for everyone to hurry up and die by the end, and by the sound of it so was much of the theater. I *applauded* when Black Phillip gored the dad, and then groaned when dad was killed by his woodpile. Ugh, spare me the irony. (Sidebar: that goat was a tremendous screen presence imho)
By far the most charismatic goat I have seen; wish it had been the star of the movie
aaaaand that link won’t work because the punctuation got included… https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_ointment
anyway. i’m still really excited about how seriously people apparently used to take the idea that witches needed a special kind of ointment to fly.
I both love and hate the word ‘ointment’
Well, you know. Until one breaks in one’s broomstick, blisters are practically assumed.
Cosign on “Miss me with that ‘is it FEMINIST’ nonsense?”
I have a hard time seeing this movie as about feminine power or oppression or whatever; it’s about PURE EVIL and the kind of bananas theology you have to concoct to live in a world where PURE EVIL exists. If you want a feminist witch movie, watch Practical Magic or something (I love Practical Magic). Like, OF COURSE these settlers are deranged with terror: a woman with the power of the LITERAL ACTUAL DEVIL could come out of the woods and PUREE THEIR BABIES.
BUT THE ENDING! I loved that ending. (Spoilers) I 100% believe that everything should end with goats being satan. Golden Girls could have ended that way and I’da been pleased. Rosebud was totally satan goat! Plus, it was a relief since I love goats and it was a blow to have the other goats meet a grizzly end. Satan goat is safe!
In which case have you seen Incubus? 1965 b&w atmospheric horror with evil goat? Starring William Shatner? In Esperanto?
No but I know what I am making every single person I know do this weekend!
Sigh. This is why I seldom go to movies anymore.
“Tither gone the mickle prayn’t, Motherling?”
I thought I should maybe see this because of the 17th century & now I don’t have to. Thank you, Mallory!
Mallory would you say this movie… gets your goat?
I haven’t seen this movie, I’m not sure I ever will (why am I reading this post again) and don’t have much interest in such like this, but goddamn that was excellent and made me chortle.
*slow clap*
I totally understand being scared by Signs – I saw it in theaters and during the basement scene I kept having to fully turn around in my seat and stare at the projector to convince myself that it was JUST a MOVIE, no one is actually in ANY PERIL especially MYSELF
THANK YOU.
Like, even as I was watching it I knew the plot was stupid, and it was still terrifying.
Some prankster banged on the theater’s emergency exit door from the outside when I saw Signs, and it was not okay.
So what I can’t tell from reviews, etc., is if the movie has any real sympathy or love for Thomasin.
fwiw, I was always pissed on her behalf and when she mouthed off to her dad about his failings I was right effing there. But I think she was cast more for her lips and eye shape than anything.
Hmm, yeah.
But does it come out as like, “teenage girls are unstoppable forces of nature, far too great for a simple human man to contain” or “man, people are shitty to teenage girls”?
More the latter, I’d say. Thomasin does nothing wrong, but is constantly getting in trouble, especially with her mother. You feel for her, but she doesn’t necessarily make a strong impression as a character. (There is a scene early in the movie where it seems like she’s going to be a shit-stirrer, which could be interesting, but it isn’t really followed up on.)
Yeah, sorry I realize the second half of my response is about the actress and not the character, but I think it’s because I agree with anon210 that she doesn’t make a strong impression really at all. Like, I kept waiting for something from her that just never materialized. The takeaway for me was more that she was being scapegoated simply by being a maturing girl — and their perception that she must by definition be an unstoppable force of nature — when really she’s constantly getting shit on just because. But it never ended up getting anywhere, which was my biggest frustration with the ending.
Yeah…it seems to kind of raise the question, but then ignore it?
It seems to land more in the camp of all mortals in constant active strife with their inherent evil, which is what I think resonates about the puritan fundamentalism. Like, witch! No, you da witch! I know you are but what am I, from cradle to grave, let’s all maim and blame each other until the goat wins.
I personally did not.
Okay, normally I politely refuse to acknowledge small errors in people’s writing, but I was left with a wonderful mental image of the devil offering me a butter dress, and that must be acknowledged and shared.
Also crows are the best birds. I am not just saying this because I owe them money.
I don’t think that was an error, though! I think Mallory humorously ran together two separate promises on purpose.
That was one part of the movie where I was like, ok, but where is the butter and the fancy dress for the naked witches who are feasting on raw goat, can you think about this for a minute before you sign the book
Jos is super wrong about ravens and crows. Why am I inexplicably hateful towards Jos now?
FIGHT ME, JOS.
The promoted content for this piece is pretty great.
I liked it, I thought it had a good buildup, and that smile at the end! So great. I wanted it to be like A Field In England in its tone, and it kind of was. I don’t get why people are comparing it to the Babadook? But I get why other people don’t like it.
I fucking loved this movie. I loved it to the point where I’m already planning a solo trip to the second-run movie theatre to see a matinee when it comes in. I pre-bought it on Google Play so I can watch it again the minute it comes online. I just loved the way it looked and I loved listening to the dialogue even if I couldn’t understand 85% of it and I loved the oppressive skies and forest and the violins and screeching and and and Thomasin witch TWINS exorcism corn Kate Dickie’s face witch body baby raven witch cottage AH. I loved it all.
1. I wish every movie review included spoilers because otherwise what is even the point.
2. Mallory claims this movie is not scary but what is more terrifying than AN ANTHROPOMORPHIC GOAT. Although, to be fair, an anthropomorphic goat was the subject of my worst recurring nightmare as a child. Shudder.
I have never seen Martyrs because literally just READING the Wikipedia plot summary gave me nightmares. FUCK THAT.
Anyway, the crow bit was totally the best and the dog part was the worst. Did the twins die in the end, or disappear, or what? I think I liked this movie but it definitely needed some more creepy crop formations.
As a person who missed Witch Graduation on purpose, I might have gone if it had involved more goat-murdering. Dianics just aren’t quite that exciting, though.
Ok but regarding Signs not being that scary I’m going to have to disagree, because lemme tell ya, I saw that movie at a friend’s house when I was about 12 or 13 and for the next few weeks I was SURE I WAS GOING TO BE MURDERED BY ALIENS.
This movie was amazing and I am shocked to disagree with Mallory for the first time
I saw this today and was really hoping for it to be much more of a psychological thriller: I agree 100% that the early reveal totally punctured this movie. If we KNOW Thomasin isn’t the witch what’s the point? Also, Caleb’s “Jesus!” scene. He certainly was acting.
Win.
I have some horror-related jerkbrain issues as well. It is no bueno. In particular, I get the cold sweats if I have to turn on a light in the kitchen or open the refrigerator in the middle of the night because THANKS 28 DAYS LATER. (That's facetious. I am not grateful at all. Not even a little. I am braced for zombies every time I have to fix the baby a bottle in the middle of the damn night.)
And again, here you are with being all the accurate.
Lack of clarity from overly ambitious directors is a little problematic. I think it comes from him coming from the direction of art production on films as opposing to writing/producing. They tend to want to throw in everything and the kitchen sink, and things get thematically muddled. That's being generous though – my kneejerk reaction to the director's choices here was, "you dumbass. "
I really want to go with tuning out patriarchal white noise because it looked moody and spooky and cool, and bonus points for how New England woods, lack of plumbing and electricity, constant fear of everyone around you, and goats are all legit unnerving. it was pretty trailer! But I just cannot get past the fact that just, you know, being female was a straight up psychological thriller in Puritan New England. Maybe I am oversensitive. I honestly don't know.
Alright, you know why satan showed in the form of a bunny- it is an actual religious symbol used by Celtic pagans. And some person is probably going to say ‘well, actually, it’s because documents of witch trials said witches took the form of hares’. No shit, dude- it comes from Celtic lore where the goddess takes the form of a hare. And someone else is going to say ‘well modern Wicca isn’t based in historical fact’ and I am going to say in your face, sukkah, there are Druids chilling in Ireland right now with ancient manuscripts documenting their practices. Also, are you trying to say nee nee we can depict your religious symbols as we like because all of your ancestors were burned for liking them and you can’t prove shit? That is cold, imaginary person.
William was Chris Finch from The Office? I knew I recognized that ridiculous boom from somewhere! I loved it, and the performances are one of the main reasons. They reeled me in and more than made up for any stretches of not much happening. Especially when Caleb came back for the last time and Thomasin’s confrontation with her Dad about his major failings.
I have to say I hate stuff like this and the tv show Salem that suggest that the witch hunting mass panic was even a little justified. It was the Age of Enlightenment yet there were so many people believing in hysterical bullshit and superstition, and many innocent people died. Anyone trying to attach actual supernatural meaning to it is contributing to the kind of illogical moral panic shite that allows things like this to happen again and again.
OK, rant over. I just needed to get that out. Thanks.
Psst… When you notice the acting, that means the acting isn’t good. I one hundred percent fault the director when this happens. But you are NOT supposed to notice the acting. If you find yourself using the phrase “acting up a storm,” to describe the acting, the director has failed; I don’t care how beautiful the sets and costumes and lighting are. OK. I feel I can now go on with my day.
There was no witch!
Thomasin was a sociopath and Lizzie Borden’ed her family. At the end she had a complete mental break with her reality.
If you re-watch the movie you see AND hear little clues pointing to Thomasin as the killer.