The horror genre has had something of a boom lately. In the past few years a handful of arthouse directors have managed to reinvigorate the rote and familiar genre script (though, Hollywood, like always, is lagging behind, fixated only on churning out sequels to anything that makes a buck). One noteworthy aspect of these new films is their attempt to scare not through gore or shaky cam or the thousand other cliched genre tropes, but through mind games (“Goodnight Mommy”), atmosphere (“The Babadook”), and completely new imaginings of monsters (“It Follows”). One film, though, is revolutionary in its complete and utter throwback perfection: “The Witch.”
READ MORE: The 25 Best Horror Films Of The 21st Century So Far
We loved “The Witch” when it debuted at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival, and we weren’t alone. The film has been rightfully adored from critics and horror fans alike. And a huge part of that love is surely born of the careful depth that first time director Robert Eggers imbued into every aspect of the film. It’s a genre throwback of the highest caliber, one that takes everything good from a forgone moment in film and distills it into what we called, “A spellbinding, absolutely nightmareish picture that will genuinely make your blood run cold.”
To breakdown just why “The Witch” is so good and so damn scary (and it is really damn scary), Renegade Cut has put together a thoughtful and chilling new video essay. The 10-minute video runs down all the subtle intricacies packed within “The Witch,” and it highlights just how searing an indictment the film is of certain aspects of religion.
Whether or not you were a fan of the film, the video is well worth the watch. Though, beware, spoilers obviously abound. Check out the video, and weigh in with your thoughts in the comments below.
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Full disclosure: I’m a Christian- of the weekly churchgoing, daily praying, non-Trump-voting variety.
THE WITCH is a fantastic movie. Saw it first on release this winter, then again a couple of weeks ago when I showed it to my friend who’s a professor at a Baptist university. Engendered quite the provocative conversation and the next morning I heard him recommended it to some of his students he saw at church.
This is such a complex, rewarding film that it’s possible to be very much impacted by it and yet not still see the forest for the trees. The analysis in this video is the kind of facile explanation that gives criticism a bad name.
First off, it’s significant they aren’t just banished summarily, against their will- well, not their patriarch’s will. In that opening scene he says he will be “glad” of a banishment, that he & his family are the only true Christians anyway. He decides to go about his faith alone, trusting his own piety as sufficient. He removes himself and his family from community. It’s hubris right off the bat- or, in Biblical terms, pride. This puts the family’s dedication to their homestead, and their faith, in a different context than that of merely an outcast or pariah group; from the very start, the character of *their* faith, and not just *the* faith, is called into question.
Where you really misstep is in trying to use the film as a proof text for the unreliability of religious morality. Honestly, if I hadn’t seen the movie already I would think it was some kind of screed or tract. This mischaracterizes not only the movie but Christian theology. You seem to have just enough knowledge to remain safely ignorant and undisturbed by any implications of THE WITCH for yourself, much less The Bible.
Yes, the simple thought of lust is declared immoral in Jesus’ words in Matthew, a section most commonly known as The Sermon On The Mount. But it’s not a commandment, it’s not a list. On the contrary, The Sermon On The Mount is meant to remind us just how impossible it is for us to obey or follow any kind of moral code. What Jesus is communicating is that we are much more morally culpable than we knew, we can’t do it on our own. Which is precisely what William assumes he can.
By holding to and employ this binary interpretation of The Bible like you do in the video- that The Bible is a collection of moral precepts, exhortations and admonishments, you don’t do any better than the legalists. “There’s a lot of incest in the Bible anyway,” you snicker. Come ON, dude. Would you really read The Bible in the manner of the fundamentalists you decry? Would you read Moby Dick this way, looking for contradictions so you can play “Gotcha!” with Herman Melville and deciding the novel has no meaning or import because its characters are foolhardy and lack the moral fiber of you, the reader?
(Also, the other twin’s name is Jonas, not Jonah. And the apple could be original sin, ok, but it is most definitely a reference to the apples Caleb lied about seeing.)
Yes, like a lot of ancient wisdom literature the Bible *does* contain moral guidelines and instruction for the reader. And are these then rendered invalid because we cannot follow them with consistency? Can lust not be harmful, or is it just an antiquated concept? Does incest not have consequences, can sexual relations within families be recommended without reservation? And in this reading of THE WITCH, can we really object to the clear evil Thomasin aligns herself with- an evil that murders a baby and mashes up his corpse to be rubbed all over its shriveled, pustulant body?
A truly feminist reading of THE WITCH must address the great, objective evil the film depicts. This isn’t happy ’empowerment’ or freedom or a symbolic ‘subversion of the patriarchy’, it’s bondage to a demonic force. Thomasin has been ‘liberated’ to be a murderess, to the abandonment in worship of one who demands human sacrifice. This is, in your words, “new life” that will have her grovel in the woods and warp her body into that of a feral gargoyle. All so that she may “live deliciously.” Is it worth it? And if it is, what does that say about this sort of ‘liberation’?
But in THE WITCH, that’s just what the faith of her family, as they lived it, drove her to. What better option did she have? What teenager, being left alone and having seen her family murdered and killing her mother by her own hand- while it’s all the least fault of herself, /wouldn’t/ decide to “live deliciously”?
I am not sure Eggers understands why his film is so incisive. But his strict adherence to the period and refusal to editorialize (with the possible exception of the film’s effective score) facilitated a warning- or, if you rather, and as the title card states, a fairy tale -specifically for Christians and this nation that so many self-professed ones call home.
THE WITCH is horror, an encounter with forces that cannot be rationalized away or warded off by some magic incantation, proper theology, or intellectual detachment. I should wonder by your reading of the film that you identified with the family at all; I get the impression like you spent all the movie saying “Yup, yup” and delighting in your calcified dismissal of The Bible and Christianity by extension.
I’m still not enthusiastic about this whole “Pitchfork indie band” form of horror that critics are loving. I don’t know why, exactly. I’m no dummy and I love every nuance of great filmmaking, but these films just bore me.