THE WITCH Is a Chillingly Awesome Supernatural Thriller - Sundance 2015 Review
The Witch is easily the best movie that I've seen at Sundance so far! It is an awesomely well-made supernatural thriller that includes some pretty fantastic terrifying moments. This flick is creepy as hell, and the story it tells was brilliantly brought to life on the big screen.
The film is a colonial period piece set in New England in the 1600s, in which a man and his family are banished from the town they lived in. They are sent out to build a life for themselves in the wilderness. Things seem to be going well until their baby mysteriously disappears, never to return. This sends the family into a downward spiral of paranoia and madness and drives them to turn against one another as they try to move forward with their lives. The Devil is among them, and he wants this family to be torn apart in the most brutal of ways.
I loved this story, and the characters were developed extremely well. They were incredibly rich and interesting. The film was very much a character study, and I couldn't get enough of witnessing their descent into insanity. I know that may sound a little demented, but it is just done so well! I was completely engulfed in the story and what was happening from the very opening shot to the final frame of the film. It is a thing of destructive beauty.
The movie also looks amazing! The cinematography is stunning. It is one of the most beautifully shot films that I've seen in years. There are visual in the movie that I definitely won't forget. The way they use natural lighting to give this movie a period look is incredible. It enhances the eerie vibe of the story. There are certain shots in the film that I was completely in awe of. One of those was just a simple close-up of the main female character in the dark while she watches her father going mad. The way her face is lit makes her eyes pop with emotion, and it is just exquisite.
As for the acting in the film, everyone in it is virtually unknown, but they all give stellar performances. The actors include Anya Taylor Joy, Ralph Ineson, Kate Dickie, Harvey Scrimshaw, Ellie Grainger, and Lucas Dawson. They bring their characters to life in a way that I don't think anyone else could. It is chilling at times to see how well they play these characters. Especially the kids! I don't know how director Robert Eggers got the kids to deliver such mind-blowing performances, but he did it. This was actually Eggers' debut feature film, which he wrote and directed, and he just knocked it out of the park. I hope this guy has a successful career ahead of him.
This movie may not be for everyone, and I think it might be hard to market to general audiences. It's a brooding, slow-burn kind of horror story, and not everyone at the festival liked it as much as I did. But it's intense, and it's actually a pretty hardcore movie, as it doesn't hold back on anything. They take it to the extreme, and I loved that about it! I really hope that this movie gets a wide theatrical release, because I'd love to see it on the big screen again. It's also a film that needs to be seen on the big screen to get the full effect of its excellence.
This is the best movie that I've ever seen that is set in this time period and location, dealing with this subject matter. It's just so damn authentic in every way possible. I seriously can't wait to see what Eggers does next. This is a movie you have to see when it's eventually released.
Here's the official description:
A colonial family leaves plantation life and attempts to reap their harvest on a fledgling farm at the edge of an imposing ancient New England forest. Soon, superstition and dread set in as food grows scarce, a family member goes missing, and the children's play takes on a frenzied and menacing undercurrent. As they begin to turn on one another, the malevolent machinations of an ethereal presence from within the woods exacerbate the growing corruption of their own natures.
In his debut feature, writer/director Robert Eggers painstakingly designs an authentic re-creation of New England generations before the 1692 trials in Salem, immersing the audience in a bygone era and evoking the alluring and terrifying power of the witch myth as the timeless terror of this folk tale envelops us. Aided by a creeping camera and ominous score, the stark historical realism of The Witch creates a chilling portrait of a family unraveling within their own fears and anxieties, leaving them prey for an opportunistic evil.