Anyone going to see this this weekend? Supposed to be really good... Dean Richards said he pissed his pants in the theater.

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Yes. Been wanting to see this one for a while.

Double post

Let us know what you think, HG. My old man wants to see it, so I'm gonna wait to see it with him next weekend. The reviews are outstanding for a movie like this... horror movies usually get shit on.

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Don't forget to cut a hole in the bottom of the bucket of popcorn you'll share!

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Mods, please delete.

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Yes. I consider myself somewhat of a horror movie buff. At least in my head I do. I'm probably just a biff with buff potential. This movie recieved better reviews than The Conjuring and that's the best horror movie made in years.

Movie sucked ass. I'll give some details tomorrow.

I'm gonna guess it had something to do with the goat.

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i'll be seeing it tomorrow.

Anyone who thinks this movie is so scary that they pissed their pants is a moron. There are a few scenes that are tense and I did jump once (although my fiancee laughed at me because she didn't and I should of saw it coming) but overall it's one of those movies where nothing really happens. On top of that, its hard to tell why any of this is even happening and why you should care. Between the crazy thick English accents and constant bible speak, its hard to understand what the fuck anyone is saying most of the time.

Some scenes that are suppose to be scary came across as really corny to me but the biggest issue as a whole is that it's just a boring ass movie about a family of religious simpletons being tormented by a black rabbit with red eyes.

On the positive side there are a couple of really cool scenes and the actress who played the teenage girl did an excellent job. I expect to see her around in various movies going forward.

If I had to give it a rating I'd only give it one WZ out of 4. I lasted the full movie eventhough I considered walking out twice (5 people left early to my count). No clue what the critics saw on this one.

viewtopic.php?f=75&t=98805&start=25

Now I know why you were so upset in this thread.

Seriously, though, thanks for the review. I wonder why the critics are so high on it. Curious to read WZ's thoughts.

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Beat me by a minute

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dicks

I do it all the time. Like I said in the thread, "of" just sounds better to me.

well, i can tell you i absolutely loathed "the cabin in the woods" and it has a 92% fresh rating on RT. now, that wasn't a horror movie to scare you, it was supposed to make you lau-haha-augh. and i cringed pretty much throughout. and when i wasn't cringing, i was looking for an extension cord long enough to wrap around the entire cast's necks and hang them from a crane.

Agreed.

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you people are always blaming the goat

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

ok. i agree with a lot of this. i wouldn't go as far as to say it "sucked balls" but it was funny right when the film ended, i heard someone behind me go, "that was just stupid."

these heady "slow burn fucked up" horror movies are really hit or miss for me. loved "eraserhead", things like that. hated "begotten", "lords of salem", movies that are too ambitious for their own good (or in the case of "salem", just lazy).

the biggest problem that doomed this film from the start was that none of the characters are interesting, engaging, or even appealing. the weird little twins are irritating as hell, the boy and father are bland, the mom is like a scared cat shrieking throughout, and our protagonist is not given enough personality in the script to flesh her out (although we do see a ton of her flesh in the film).

i get that the filmmaker wanted to make this "true" but using that colonial tongue was a real misjudgment. like HG said, i could barely understand what the hell these people were saying when they were talking. sometimes that wasn't a problem for me but eventually it really got under my skin. i almost felt i was being punked like "the village"--are we gonna break the 4th wall here eventually and see it's a ruse? no. these people talk like this throughout. thee, thine, mays't, be'st, etc. it just takes you out of the film.

another thing that was a problem for me was giving "the witch" screen time making us think this is going to turn into some kind of story where the family has to go to the village to get help removing her from the forest. something grand, or epic. no. we barely see the witch again, but the strange and wild stuff keeps happening.

also, for a movie striving to be fresh and original, there are some cliches that are teeth gritting. and there should've been an ominous feel to the whole atmosphere. i never really felt it. it was drab, not ominous.

also as HG said there were some eerie things and the premise was interesting. i give the filmmaker marks for making something different. but it just never really got to me. it seemed to want it both ways--there are witches, but there are also batshit insane religious people that will sabotage themselves in the name of their faith. the father steals from his wife, he's burdened with bad crop and can't hunt successfully. the boy has sexual feelings, he winds up encountering the witch in beautiful form. pretty much all the characters become their own undoing.

and yet...we have a talking goat, a decrepit old hag, and naked burning man-esque visuals telling us there is a coven or something in these woods. it just doesn't come together.

i am baffled that this is being so highly praised. i think in some ways some people just want to believe they're being enlightened because this movie came out of nowhere. it'll be that movie that hipsters will latch onto because it "seems" intellectual, visually captivating and creepy. to me everything down to the obnoxious soundtrack was overdone. it was overcooked.

and the longest 90 minutes i've endured in a long time.

out of

I think you guys are being too harsh on the film. The movie reminded me of Shamalan's better stuff (and yes, I did feel like I would get the carpet pulled out from me in a Village way as well).

SPOILERS

The movie was schizophrenic in that it didn't know if it wanted to be a psychological thriller or a horror movie. It seemed like a horror movie at the beginning. I loved how the witches first scenes were shot with the darkness/flickering light offering as much suggestion of the grisly act as actually showing it.

The archaic English (I was surprised to learn that things like Shakespeare are considered as modern English as we speak today linguisticly) was cumbersome. However, as they explained at the end, they were often quoting directly from court testimony of witch trials. Sure it could have been adapted but I really don't think it would have lessened the impact. This was a New England horror story. Ultimately, it didn't bother me that much because this is a movie that could have been told with almost no dialogue.

I like horror (I don't concede that this is a horror movie) that play with archetypes. The forest, solitude, emerging sexuality...these are all things most of us can identify with and that naturally produce fear because of confusion. I thought the movie was excellent in its first scenes (including the previously mentioned first view of the witch). It was strong in building that this group would be cut off from their religion (small) and then society (bigger). As those gates closed, you could feel the doom. Even the Native Americans were within the safety of the gates.

However, I do agree, there was almost no character development. They are all really stuck in that moment from beginning to end. The only backround we really know is that the mother never really wanted to leave the comfort of England.

I also thought the ending was confused. The girl was the one who was faithful to the end. She never displayed covetousness towards a different life. In fact, she fought to stay with the family in their solitude. Even when faced with death by her mom, she uses self defense as a last resort. Yet, at the end, she turns and solicits the devil. That doesn't make sense. It would have been more understandable if she killed the goat and discovered a coven.

That is the ultimate undoing of this movie. It is confused. I know there is a witch. They show her to us early. Yet, I never am really sure she exists until the end. This family could have just as easily been breaking down over the stress of their chosen (and unchosen) lifestyle.

I still enjoyed the movie. I did not find it too long. I give it

out of 5. It is worthy of seeing. I support what they were trying to do but would have liked better execution.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

There was one early shot that I particularly loved: the first night in the woods with the fire going. The people were unmoving and it looked like a Rembrandt to me, except for the movement of the fire.

I thought there were quite a few moments like that in the movie, just beautifully haunting images with almost no movement and the camera stuck on the moment for a few extra seconds. The crow image was like that for me as well.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

Possibly related to the Rabbit of Caerbannog

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there were a few times that MP came to mind while watching this. i mean, "a witch! a witch!" could be shouted throughout.

GD, i got all that. i understood the film had its heart in the right place. it still wasn't all that compelling to me, and i thought the filmmaker's inconsistencies that you also pointed out also led to its downfall. there are individual moments that work, there are images that are haunting. but that doesn't make it a good film. its last scene proves that the writer/director didn't have enough confidence in his work to drive the point home. instead it came off as confused. the themes (sexual oppression, doubt, idolatry, religious zeal) became muddled because it became more an exercise in atmosphere than it did with storytelling. and even in atmosphere it wasn't a complete success.

I'm not a movie critic. In fact, I'm terrible at judging the "art" of a movie. I definitely hoped and expected that I would disagree with HG and WZ. But I have to completely agree.

First, it's not the least bit scary. I don't think it even attempts to be. It's more a psychological exploration than a horror movie.

Second, even the psychological angle fails because no one gives a shit about the characters.

Halfway through, I wanted to walk out... but it got better. The second half explores more of the family dynamics and the accusations of witchcraft. There are a few moments when you feel bad for the family due to their hopelessness, but mostly, you just want the mom to die.

I thought the best scene in the movie was the boy approaching the witch's den, but they didn't play it out long enough.


And, call me a perv, but seeing the girl's stunt double naked at the end was peak witch, IMO.

2.5 out of 5 seems right

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Great song by The Sonics.

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Thank you. You're right, the second half is a little more intriguing but it just completely falls apart in the end. This is really amateur student film level stuff here, and I don't know why it keeps getting high praise.

But really, let's call it what it really is. It's not The Witch. It's The VVitch. Now let's toast the Dark Lord.