April 4, 2016 -- This tale about witches is the opposite of J.K. Rowling's witches. This story makes Lord Voldemort look like a pussy. This is old school witchcraft, as in 17th century American religious hysteria, madness and murder.

The story begins with a kind of religious trial. A family is asked to leave a religious settlement because the head of the family, William (Ralph Ineson of “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2”) has religious beliefs (and “prideful conceit”) at odds with the rest of the group. Along with his wife, Katherine (Kate Dickie of “Prometheus”) daughter Thomasin (Anya Taylor-Joy) and three younger children, William tries to establish a farm next to a dark forest.

While Thomasin is playing with a baby born on the farm, the baby suddenly disappears, apparently stolen by a witch living in the forest. This mysterious witch is glimpsed only a few times in the movie, most fully by Thomasin's oldest brother, Caleb (Harvey Scrimshaw) who gets lost in the forest and encounters the witch, who seduces him. He dies of a mysterious illness soon after this encounter.

The mysterious disappearance of the child and the mysterious death of Caleb serve to tear the family apart. Their Christian religion, on which they depend so heavily, is no help to them as the family members turn on each other. The two youngest children, twins Mercy and Jonas, accuse Thomasin of being a witch, and she accuses them in return. There is some evidence to support both claims.

It gets even uglier as members of the family increasingly hate and accuse each other of evil doings. Evil begets more evil. Christian love, mercy and compassion are nowhere to be found on this farm, or in the dark recesses of the forest. In a sense, the movie lets these people off the hook for the evil deeds done in the film, by blaming the devil. The film can also be interpreted as not being supernatural. The film tries to have its supernatural cake, and fake reality too. The result is messy as the two themes slop over each other.

With a little tweaking, this story could have been told in a more believable way, but it veers a bit too far into the supernatural for that. An argument can be made that the seemingly supernatural elements can be explained away as dreams, delusions, malice or mental illness. However, I think the supernatural explanation is certainly the easier argument to make, and is more in keeping with the traditional witch stories on which this film is based.

Either way, this story is close enough to reality to expose the ugliest aspects of the characters, their secret fears, basest desires, jealousy, avarice and how these lead to the downfall of the family. Watching this movie is like watching a person who starts out healthy, get progressively sicker and dies, and there is absolutely nothing anyone can do about it.

The movie makes a point of showing the sexual attraction that Caleb has for his voluptuous, beautiful sister, Thomasin. The Puritanical hangups with sexual desires and sexual acts are very much at the heart of this story. Other themes include the fatal hubris of trying to control natural desires and nature itself. This is a super dark and depressing story. Though it is well acted, and it does have some emotional power, I sure would not recommend that anyone spend money to see this movie. It rates a C.

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Copyright © 2016 Robert Roten. All rights reserved.
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