245: The Witch (2015)

SPEAKER_02 0:04

And the little chihuahua says, if this is torture, chain me to the wall. Greetings and salutations, and welcome to Hacker Slash. If you're joining us again, welcome back. I be The Witch of the Wood, and I have come to steal you. If this is your first time listening, welcome to the party. We are a horror movie review podcast dedicated to telling you whether a movie is a hack.

SPEAKER_00 0:28

A total joke. A waste of time.

SPEAKER_02 0:30

Or a slash.

SPEAKER_00 0:31

Totally killer, pun intended.

SPEAKER_02 0:33

We believe horror is for everyone, and as such, we're rating these movies with the perspective we've gained from our varying walks of life and the flavors of fear we fancy most. My name is Chris, I'm your friendly neighborhood slasher enthusiast. This week I'm joined by the Superfly Space Guy Mac.

SPEAKER_01 0:46

I will guide thy hand.

SPEAKER_02 0:48

And the classic horror connoisseur Sean. What's thou like to live deliciously? This episode is brought to you by Manscaped, who is the best in below the waist grooming. This week we're traveling back to a 2015 film that drops us 62 years before the Salem Witch trials. Before we get down to business though, we have some follow-up.

SPEAKER_01 1:09

Let's follow up on a movie. We recently watched Hellraiser from this year, 2022. And boy, I enjoyed it. I know everyone else here seemed to enjoy it. And we asked you, what did you think? And guess what? 81% of you slashed it and only 19% hacked it.

SPEAKER_02 1:26

That sounds favorable.

SPEAKER_01 1:27

Sounds right. Well, boy, do we have some sites to show you. Mostly, that's you know, your thoughts on the film. So over on Patreon, Samurai said, I emerge from the Leviathan configuration having seen a true slash. Gotta read this novella though, because hot damn.

SPEAKER_02 1:42

I mean, honestly, is there a better way to tempt you into reading than watching this movie?

SPEAKER_00 1:46

Never even uh read the novella. Have either of you actually read it?

SPEAKER_02 1:49

I started reading some of it. I did not get to finish before the movie, but it is very brief and easily accessible, so I do recommend it. I know one of our patrons has.

SPEAKER_01 1:57

Hmm. I'll have to check it out. Now Jake says, 'Twas a soft slash. Just wish it was shorter by 30 minutes. Uh, not my kind of horror. The original was okay, but I'm just not big on this kind of concept.

SPEAKER_02 2:09

I think 30 minutes shaved off the end could have could have done some work. I think uh I was satisfied with the overall runtime, but I'm curious, Jake, then what where you would have liked that to end.

SPEAKER_01 2:20

Now Mark says, I'm so happy about this. I actually preferred this movie to the original. It gave me more of the Cenabites, better lore, and Jamie Clayton was so good. Now that to me, that's that's a hot take right there. Better than the original. That's that's a big a big claim.

SPEAKER_00 2:34

That is a big claim. Yeah. I I don't know if it's better than the original, but I do agree with the points, so that's interesting.

SPEAKER_02 2:40

Jamie Clayton's just that good.

SPEAKER_01 2:42

Over on Instagram, Robbie said, as a diehard Hellraiser fanatic, I love this remake. Nett said loved it, but could have been hornier and gorier.

SPEAKER_02 2:50

Listen, it can always be hornier and it can always be gorier.

SPEAKER_01 2:54

Talon didn't agree, saying Hulu Razor did not impress me. Hulu Razor, nice. Alan says, a nice addition to the Hellraiser universe. Visually great and looking forward to more. Cobain said, I enjoyed it. Still doesn't touch the original though. The Hell Priest is killer. And finally, Gabe says, I feel like it didn't give or take anything away from the original. I liked the gore. I feel like as a prequel, there should have been a little more in-depth about who and what they are, where they come from, etc. I feel like they really didn't do much other than like a retelling of the first story, but also half-assed it that made me feel bad for loving pain and pleasure, you know?

SPEAKER_02 3:27

Yeah, I mean, I can see how you'd feel bad for enjoying pain and pleasure, especially because of the depths of pain that they go to in this movie. But this definitely is not a prequel. It's a retelling, right? So, you know, Gabe, I'd be curious to know if you went into this with a fresh perspective, like a knowing what it is now, would it fare better on a rewatch? Especially if you went in with the expectation that it would be a prequel.

SPEAKER_00 3:52

Fair point.

SPEAKER_01 3:53

And lastly, we want to say hello and thank you to our newest patron, Jay. Welcome to the family. Yay, Jay. And that's our follow-up.

SPEAKER_02 4:01

Well, traveling back in time, when Robert Eggers was a small child growing up in New England, he was fascinated by witches. After a lifetime of fascination with folk tales and written accounts of historical witchcraft, Eggers began writing the script for a period film that would ultimately become his directorial debut. The film explores the pain a sixteen thirties New England family endures as they encounter mysterious disappearances, hardships, and signs of witchcraft. This week we're talking about The Witch. Who's seen this one before?

SPEAKER_00 4:29

I definitely have seen this one before. I watched it when it came out back in 2015, but I haven't seen it since.

SPEAKER_01 4:36

This has been on my watch list for years, and I feel bad that it took this long to get to it, but I have not seen it until we are covering it now.

SPEAKER_02 4:44

So this is one of those movies that was hotly overhyped back in the day. Not that I ever doubted it would be a good thing, but there are just so many people talking about it that I could not realistically like give it a fair shot had I watched with the expectations that have been placed upon me. So I'm actually really happy now that we're finally getting to it because I kind of got back to a neutral state on this film. Like, yes, I know logistically or objectively, people have said amazing things about this movie, but I couldn't remember a damn thing in detail of what they said, which realistically is where I need to get with Hereditary. So this movie came out for A24, Hereditary came out soon after, and man, I swear I get like three months into thinking, okay, I might be able to watch Hereditary, and then somebody will bring it up at work saying, Oh, have you seen Hereditary? What'd you think about that? I just watched it for the first time. Could you believe when this happened? I'm like, fuck. That being said, though, I went into this with the expectation of it to be great, while also acknowledging it would probably be a slow burn, which I admit, thinking about like period pieces in general, I'm not a huge, huge fan of them. So I was a little skeptical about whether or not I'd purely enjoyed this film.

SPEAKER_01 5:59

You know, I I think for me folk horror is typically either the bees or nearly two hours of WTF. And from everything I had heard about this, kind of like you, Chris, I expected the latter. I expected it uh to just be good, but also just pure madness for the entire runtime.

SPEAKER_00 6:16

Yeah, first of all, I love the history of witchcraft, right? Really drawn to specifically this time period, the whole 1600s in general. Salem witch trials. I remember going to Salem, Massachusetts as a child and visiting um the Salem Witch Trial Museum and just really immersing myself in all of that history. I really fell in love with it. Really just interested in religion of all kinds, but this time period specifically. And I remember watching this film when it first came out and thinking that it was a really interesting film. I remember it being really good. But that being said, I haven't seen it in, I don't know, quite some time. So I was really curious to see how it was gonna hold up after all these years.

SPEAKER_02 6:55

Yeah, see, thinking about like the Salem Witch trials, it's the horrors that women were faced with for being seen as subservient or being blamed for literally fucking anything that happened. And I know we talked about this a bit in our Fear Street 1666 episode, and I think that kind of movie where you take the twist that that pulled into how they how they portrayed the characters based on the rest of the trilogy, when you think about the central romance in that movie, that movie did a lot to really have me captivated and and uh it felt compelling for a 1600s movie. So when I went into this and I thought, I might end up being a little bit bored, I was really surprised to find that I wasn't bored at all. And man, I also wasn't expecting for this movie to just be so painful. So I again knew nothing about the plot. I knew that there's a family, I knew there was a goat, and I knew that someone was gonna live deliciously, and that's it. So to to be in this movie and to see what this family goes through every step of the way, I was hooked completely the entire way through.

SPEAKER_01 8:01

Yeah, I mean, this movie makes you very glad to live in the present day with all of like the mun details of everyday life, but those are nearly constantly overcast by this intense level of suspense, gloom, and pure grotesqueness.

SPEAKER_00 8:15

Yeah, absolutely. I I had a lot of feelings watching this movie. Um, and one of the biggest things is that, you know, I imagine this time period in the 1600s as being like one of the scariest times to live outside of maybe the dark ages or something like that, right? Just in general, even the woods up there in like the northern east coast, New England, Maine, all of that, they're just straight up fucking scary. Like I I've been in woods up there. Um my grandparents have a have a house in Jefferson, Maine in the middle of nowhere, and they're surrounded by woods, and it's creepy even in the daytime, and you can get lost so easily in those woods.

SPEAKER_01 8:49

And you mentioned earlier, Chris, like how there was this certain expectation of like slowness to this movie. And I think we all, anytime you get into Folk Horror, there's especially in the 1600s, you think there's gonna be some of that. So I was I don't even know if surprise is the right word. I think I was shocked that this movie like jumps right in to showing you, hey, there's no holes barred, things are gonna get wild. And it was able, I think, to like just string that along from start to finish. It kept that that theme the entire time. And I was not expecting that. I was expecting, like you said, just kind of a slow burn.

SPEAKER_02 9:23

Oh, absolutely. There are two shocking moments in this movie that figuratively had my jaw on the floor. I was completely shocked by some of the visuals that we get. Not that this movie is like, you know, we just talked about Hellraiser, not that it's intensely gory or disgusting or grotesque, but because this movie drops you into such depth with its characters and you know, has you, you know, emotionally invested in what's happening, there are two moments in here that I found completely jarring and so disconnected in terms of what I was expecting that uh when this movie ended, I thought, what the hell did I just watch? But not in a bad way, but in a holy shit, I don't think I've had that kind of feeling in a while, kind of way.

SPEAKER_00 10:04

Yeah, that's interesting. So the feelings, I don't know. Like the for me, this film um had a lot of interesting feelings. I can't tell, like, so I'm not religious by any means, but and I so I maybe I can't relate to the film in that sense, but I am very interested in all things religion, and I think that that's why I'm so captivated by this film, and and even other films like The Exorcist and anything that deals with religion as a foundation for the story. Um, but one thing that I that I felt um throughout this film was that it really sheds light on a very dark time in American history that really dates back even to Europe, with you know, where misogyny and and uh jealousy are used to you know accuse or denounce innocent women of witchcraft, which is like almost impossible to prove or disprove, right? So it very, very interesting feelings throughout this film.

SPEAKER_02 10:55

Yeah, it's interesting that you point that out, Sean, because you know, I know that we've I think we've shared at some point over the course of the show what our our individual religious beliefs are. I think it's interesting that you come from someone as who doesn't have a religious background at all, but is fascinated by it. I am someone who is not religious at all and I am not interested in it. But I do respect it, right? Like I'm not someone who's particularly like kind of yuck your yums and really like denounce any kind of religion or your belief in higher power or anything like that. So I find that movies that deal with spirituality, while they creep me out when I was raised Catholic as a child, it has completely lost its effect. So when I watch this movie, I lose the creepiness or the scariness of the religious aspects. And all I really see are just everybody accusing women and denouncing women. And it's a different type of pain, right? Or it's a different type of horror to look at, which I think this movie does a really beautiful job of balancing the two.

SPEAKER_00 11:56

Yeah, but then that is scary in and of itself, right? That's scary, you know. Maybe as a woman living in that time period, like that is horrific.

SPEAKER_01 12:06

Wasn't scary to me because that's just who I am, you know, but there are some great moments that are so tense that you're like on the edge of your seat because you're like, they wouldn't do this. They absolutely and then they were just like, not only are we gonna do it, we're gonna show ya. We're gonna show you how crazy we are at showing you how crazy they were.

SPEAKER_02 12:24

Yeah, and you know what? For all the moments this this movie says, uh, but wait, hold my beer. I'm gonna take it up a notch. I'm completely shocked by how different this feels from any other entry I've seen into like 1600s New England or colonial life, or you know, even just a movie about witchcraft in general. And I think it's because of the duet the duality of the horror and the depth of the characters. Because man, I usually do not give a shit about a little family unit. I mean, when you think about it, this movie is dad moves entire family into a house and spooky shit happens. So fundamentally it's the Amineyville horror, right? But it still feels like it so effortlessly weaves its genre pieces, its horror pieces, and then just the emotional undercurrent with you know Anya Taylor Joy's uh performance. This movie is just stunning and unique.

SPEAKER_00 13:22

Yeah, I gotta say the film is very methodical in the way that the story is delivered. The film is super eerie and unsettling, even a little spooky in a sense, very suspenseful throughout the film. But yeah, it literally took a lot of historical documentation around the time period with witchcraft and taking inspiration from uh you know actual journals and diaries and stuff, and they even put that towards that at the end of the movie, right? And actual court cases uh that uh and whatnot that are really put in into life in the form of a film, and it gives you insight on just how dark and deranged it was back then. To me, there hasn't been a film quite like this one before, and I feel like it's very original in the way that it tells the story and how it takes all of the information and really brings it to life and and for us all to watch it unfold.

SPEAKER_01 14:13

Yeah, you know, I I think if you feel similarities to other films, you're you're not crazy. Like there's there's obviously the period piece vibes, which you're gonna, you know, if you've seen The Crucible, you're gonna you're gonna get some of that going on here. Maybe a little bit of Fear Street, I had some of that going on as well. Um there's there's some elements to the story that you mentioned, Chris. We've seen in a lot of other horror films because it's just like the basics of making a horror film, especially about a family. But I think, like you said, Sean, this this story, this telling, this uh like this family and their struggles in particular are absolutely original and nuts. And the way that it's on screen here, I was not prepared for, it did not expect, and it stands alone even in full core.

SPEAKER_02 14:56

Okay, but here's the thing there is an element of this movie that I feel is a little bit rinse and repeat, and I did not know this going in, and of course, when I saw this, I really wished I had seen this movie before another A24 film, but the ending of this movie, as spectacular as it is, as stunning as it is visually, it gave me the same energy as another folklore A24 film, and I cannot unsee that.

SPEAKER_01 15:22

Oh yeah, 100%, 100%. I like the way that the story wraps up, and it gets to this point where I was like, oh yeah, like okay, I can see it, that's cool. And then it gets to this thing that reminds you of another movie, and you're like, okay. So you guys like doing this or something? Is that it's just this is like your thing?

SPEAKER_00 15:37

Interesting. I uh I think I'm missing what you are alluding to, but maybe I I I feel like I've probably seen it, but I'm trying, I'm having a hard time pulling that in.

SPEAKER_01 15:47

The very last shot of the movie.

SPEAKER_00 15:48

Oh, I know what you're talking about. I'm just trying to I'm just trying to think of the movie that you're talking about that resonates with that.

SPEAKER_02 15:54

We'll uh we'll get there in the second half. Just you wait. Well, it sounds like we feel pretty favorably about this movie, but we'll see if that translates into some actual slashes for it. Now, before we rate The Witch, Sean, how would you describe the gore score?

SPEAKER_00 16:09

You know, this film has a decent amount of gore. Um, you see some gruesome and graphic scenes throughout the film. It may not be as gory as films like, you know, Terrifier or Dead Alive or even like the Evil Dead remake, but it has its place, and I would ultimately say it has like a medium to medium high gore score.

SPEAKER_02 16:27

Okay, a medium high for effectiveness. And what about the animal report?

SPEAKER_00 16:31

Ooh, this movie is definitely not PETA approved. There are some graphic scenes, and it is most certainly not animal safe.

SPEAKER_02 16:39

Well, let's go ahead and get into our ratings then. The Witch from 2015. Is it a hack or a slash?

SPEAKER_00 16:45

Uh for me, this film was a satisfying tale of witchcraft set in a time period that enhances the spookiness of it all. This is a folk tale deeply rooted in history. It's horrific in its own right. And I uh I was invested from start to finish. This film is a slash for me.

SPEAKER_01 17:03

I'm I'm not surprised. I'll be I'll be honest. This, when I watched this, this made me realize something. I actually really enjoy folk horror. Like it's I don't know what it is. There's just something about it, you know? One one part about it, it just like feels like uniquely American. And it's not, but it feels like there's something about the American experience that's just gritty and grotesque. Like it's just a pair of like really worn-in Levi's jeans and a and a fresh white tee and a pair of like leather boots you've had for 15 years. And when I watch these kind of films, they they also feel really worn in, they feel new enough to be fresh, uh but historically based, kind of kind of like the American experience as well. But you know, when when watching this, we're in the 1600s, you set us up for slowness, you set us up for boring, and they said no, we're not gonna do it. They went in with they started out with a bang and they finished with a bang. And I and I love that. It's just like in music, you gotta start well and you gotta end well to make it memorable. So I think they were able to successfully do that for me. It felt unique enough that I'm definitely gonna remember this for a long time. So I I enjoyed it. It kept me asking what the hell's going on the entire time, even after literally hit pause on the movie. As soon as we get to the credits, I'm thinking, what the hell? That was insane, that was wild. So yeah, it was it was a ride, but I I think overall it's a slash, it was a good ride.

SPEAKER_02 18:20

Okay, look, I'm not gonna beat around the bush. This is a period piece that had me living deliciously, and I find it so hard and and so difficult to care about characters in these time frames and to really think about like um, you know, colonial America, to think about the foundation of America. You know, it's problematic at best. While I think there are so many movies that execute stellar filmmaking to really tell these stories, I think it takes a true talent to do it with as many layers or as in this movie. And to take a 90-minute ride into this family's lives, to feel the pain every step of the way, to have us feeling these things for these characters that still leave us questioning, hmm, if I if I squint my eyes just right, could I blur the lines of what's actually happening? There is so much in this movie that is left open to interpretation, which I absolutely love. This movie didn't bore me. This movie had me invested every step of the way, and for that, it's a slash. And with that, The Witch from 2015 is a universal slash. Now you can find this movie streaming on HBO Max in the United States, so go check it out. Then join us in the second half so we can taste this butter together. See you in a bit.

SPEAKER_01 20:04

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SPEAKER_02 22:00

Sean, take us through the kills.

SPEAKER_00 22:02

We have a decent amount of kills in this film. I think we have a total of six kills throughout the film, not including animals. Some are justified, some are, you know, not justified. But I gotta say, and hopefully I don't get a lot of hate for this, but my favorite kill, I don't know, it's gotta be the baby. Is that allowed? I don't know. But it's not that I like to see the baby get killed because that is just beyond awful, but it really sets the tone for the evil that was unfolding throughout the film, right? Watching the witch like smash the remains of that baby into like a moisturizer with a butter churn or whatever the hell she was using, and then rubbing it all over herself. Like that was that's gotta be the most intense kill for me.

SPEAKER_02 22:45

Yeah, listen. Baby Samuel getting got horrific, traumatic, shocking. It was one of two moments that had my jaw figuratively on the floor. I think you can go there. Uh, not because you like seeing babies die, but because of how shocking it was, right? Like that really did set the tone, and boy was it spooky. I think my favorite death though is actually Catherine, because at that point I was just ready for her to go. Uh, not necessarily because I found her particularly unlikable. Like, obviously, there's a lot of pain that she's experiencing in this movie. Obviously, we feel for Thomason's character so much, and Catherine really just like keeps digging at her and digging at her and digging at her, but then you have to balance. She seemed perfectly happy at the beginning of the movie. It seemed like they all had a great relationship. So to see Catherine finally get put out of her misery, right, and be released of her pain and suffering. I think emotionally it was satisfying, but also I was ready for her to go.

SPEAKER_01 23:48

Well, you've both picked some some great choices here. I could never have picked Baby Samuel. I felt too bad. That was a horrific moment. I really wondered, like, am I gonna be able to make it through this movie after having seen that on screen? I feel like there was probably a like, I don't know, there's gotta be a better way to, I don't know, what is she doing, like rejuvenating herself, witching the family, cursing them? Like, can't she just like trick William into giving her a pearl necklace or something? But anyway, I think my favorite death is William's because the entire time I'm seeing Black Philip on screen, first of all, he's cute, right? He's a goat. Goats are cool, they look like they do fun stuff, but those horns are freaking massive. And I just knew like at some point somebody's getting like gored by one of these horns. And I'm glad it finally happened at the end there with with William. I'm glad that somebody got caught by a giant goat.

SPEAKER_02 24:36

And realistically, I I I mean, I knew that the goat was gonna be a presence in this movie. We see him around. I've seen gifts leading up to the moments in this in this particular scene, but the suddenness with which he gets William was unexpected. D-Man just steps outside and then bam, bitch went down.

SPEAKER_00 24:55

Yeah, definitely. William's death was was gory, it was intense for sure. Catherine's, I felt was justified in a way. I do, I just gonna go on the record. I don't like to see babies die. I'm just gonna put that out there, just for the for the soft-hearted listeners out there.

SPEAKER_02 25:11

I do think though, that you know, baby Samuel's death scene, as tragic as it is, as heartbreaking as as emotional as it is, really lends itself to one of my favorite visuals. And it's not the baby goo, it's not the blood, but it's the candles, it's the dim lighting, it's the darkness of this film. Everything about this movie is washed in gray tones and just like a really neutral palette. And it's really there in the darkness when I think this movie ironically shines. You know, we have the the rain at night when we find Caleb uh out in the dark alone. He's dazed, he's confused, he's bewitched, he's cursed. And it's in the darkest images in this movie that I think we get some of its greatest beauty.

SPEAKER_00 25:57

Yeah, that I mean, so that was one of my favorite visual elements as well, was the was the lighting and specifically the play off of the candlelight throughout the movie. But I also uh thought, you know, if I was really trying to dig deep, I thought I really enjoyed watching like the crops decay throughout the film. I thought that was a nice touch. There's something that did that that's something that like did actually plague farmers and would cause serious illness, like the disease of that crop. And it reminds me, Chris, of a movie called Honeydew.

SPEAKER_02 26:29

Oh no.

SPEAKER_00 26:30

Yes, that I subjected you to uh a while back. And so when I saw the crops decaying and and I just immediately went there and I was like, oh geez.

SPEAKER_01 26:39

I it was actually hard for me. I know you guys picked some out. It was really hard for me to pick one because the scenery, the wardrobe, the entire like period correctness of it all was incredibly impressive. But honestly, I'm gonna go with Black Philip as my favorite visual element. I think on his own, he's just really intimidating. And you know, the horns are cool, gives him like this feeling of aggression, even though he's just a goat trying to live his life. But I don't know, there's something about him like he's he's bigger, he's like a gigantic goat. And I've you when you've seen big goats in person, like they are quite intimidating. I think without him, even if they had replaced his function in the story with a different type of animal or a different character, it wouldn't have worked as well.

SPEAKER_02 27:16

Yeah, you know what? I think had we gotten just bunny Philip the entire time, you're right. It it would have been a really inadequate experience. Fox, Philip, I don't know. It doesn't have the same ring to it, you know. I think as a Capricorn, I endorse this goat fully. Just a man trying to do his job, recruiting.

SPEAKER_00 27:36

Yeah. Black Philip, definitely good visuals. Uh, it's something to be said, right? That uh animals, as you know, as innocent as they can be, they can also be super evil.

SPEAKER_01 27:48

Now, if this was based in the water, we could have had an evil dolphin, because we all know they're like total jerks, and that would have worked really well. But I think a scene that worked really well in this film was when Caleb was alone in the woods. When they got separated, when he's chasing down the rabbit, there's just something about that scene that is so gloomy and so dreary. I mean, and obviously he's lost and he's getting worried, and then everyone else is getting worried, but like we all know there's that tension. We all know something bad is about to happen, and another kid is gonna get got. And when he gets further and further into the woods and he gets more and more lost because it's this second time being in the woods ever, and he lives next to them. First of all, that's insane. They should have explored those woods, put up markers, maybe a little arrow kind of thing going on. I don't know. But like, you know, the witch is out there somewhere, we know she's got a cool little, like, you know, tiny house. And so the entire time I'm thinking he's he's gonna go to the witch. He's gonna get there, she's gonna do something to him, she's gonna boil him and mash him and put him in a stew or something. But yeah, I just that whole scene worked so well for me.

SPEAKER_02 28:47

Okay, but look, I gotta point out that the entire time he was getting got by that witch, Caleb in particular, I thought, oh, is the Horndog little brother gonna be vexed by her bosom? And then it reminded me of that really ridiculous synopsis of P2 that we read, where he like one person writing the description for that movie kept calling her a buxom businesswoman. It was just bizarre. The way that we fixated on Thomason's chest, and then you know, we see that like obviously Caleb's probably like hitting puberty at some point. It was just a little bit weird, and I thought Caleb had you been less of a horn dog, this would not be a problem.

SPEAKER_01 29:25

I got that like his sin was lust or whatever, but we didn't need to do the like the zoom in on the cleavage. Was it like was that a thing we needed?

SPEAKER_00 29:35

No, I'll be the one to say it, right? I think it did help to kind of explain, you know, what was happening to this family, and that this family, you know, felt they were so absolute in their religious beliefs, yet all of them, you know, eventually fell to sin, right? And so that's kind of the the progression of the movie, and I think it was it, I think it was fitting. I think it was information that we needed to keep the story moving forward, especially to keep Thomason's kind of like pureness throughout the film.

SPEAKER_02 30:09

Okay, but look, all I'm saying is Fowler didn't do a damn thing. That dog didn't commit a sin. Fowler didn't deserve to die.

SPEAKER_00 30:15

Not at all. That was that was the toughest thing to watch for sure. Uh that poor dog.

SPEAKER_02 30:20

For sure, it was really tough to watch. I think something that wasn't tough to watch is something that you know obviously concludes the entire film. I love seeing Thomason kind of come into her power. And I think there's a lot that's open to debate, right? It's was Thomason really going to be a witch the whole time? Did she only turn to it at the end after her entire family was lost? Was the plan always for Black Philip to recruit her specifically, or did she just kind of happen to survive so he picked up what he could while she was there? So I think there's like a lot a lot of questions there. But to see her one confront Black Philip, but then two, to emerge into the woods and to see the rest of the witches having a Sabbath dancing by the fire. It was at that moment that we see these women kind of like dancing, chanting. And I wrote in my notes, A24 really loves screaming and chanting naked women in the climax of a movie, huh? Now, honestly, this reminds me of Midsommar, and I know that this scene in mid this moment in Midsommar does not happen at the end of that movie, but it was just a bizarre moment. It was jarring in Midsommar, it was a little bit jarring here, but I think it worked better here for me.

SPEAKER_00 31:37

It was so perfect. Okay, now I get it. I get it, having seen Midsommar, but this was so perfect because uh this is this is what you would come to expect from all the things that you've learned about Covens of Witches back in this time period of women as witches dancing naked in the woods around the fire, hysterically, all of this stuff, right? And so I think that it was fitting in this story, but I gotta say, there were a lot of scenes that I really enjoyed in this film uh to kind of play off of what you were saying earlier, Mac, um, with Caleb kind of chasing the rabbit through the woods. The so obviously the witch is playing tricks with Caleb, luring him over to her, right? Um, rabbits have been have long been associated with witchcraft. Uh, and I think though, the end of that chase, if you will, right? The one of my favorite scenes was the witch herself emerging from that like little dilapidated witch hut, walking out like a creepy ass little red riding hood. The red on her cape really popped and it made the scene really captivating and beautiful to look at. That was gotta be one of my absolute favorite scenes in the film. But it's a tough one because there was a scene that we got like a glimpse of. It wasn't it wasn't a lot of runtime there, but the scene where we see you was it a silhouette of the witch herself? Uh, I'm not sure, like in front of that giant full moon in the background, that to me was awesome, also.

SPEAKER_02 33:11

Okay, so that witch emerges with her red cape, and you know what? Look, there's that moment in the Seminole Classic, Oliver and Company, and the little chihuahua says, if this is torture, chain me to the wall. Yeah, if that's the witch that I'm confronted with, curse me too. Sign me up. I'm done, I'm out there. I know I just talked shit about Caleb a second ago for being a horn dog and getting cursed, but great moment, stunning visually in more ways than one.

SPEAKER_01 33:37

You got bewitched. And and in his defense, it's just it's just the one arm that you wouldn't want to look at in that case, I guess, you know, while she's in that form. Just the just the one bad arm.

SPEAKER_00 33:47

Yeah, and uh and to to that point, right, and that just really plays off of that sin of lust, right? That that uh all of these family members are falling to, right? And so we see kind of hints of all of those um sins throughout the different characters, right? Like uh, you know, we see William with like his pride and Catherine with envy of her like beautiful daughter coming of age, and and uh obviously we talked about Caleb with lust and um and uh the tough one, right, uh that I couldn't kind of put my finger on was like Mercy and Jonas, right? Like what were those sins? Being little assholes, little bastard children.

SPEAKER_01 34:30

Got a link for the show notes uh from actually a Reddit post that really breaks it down. And this is just obviously one person's interpretation, uh, but I think it's it's kind of a pretty spot-on interpretation of what everyone's sins are. So when you go through there, I think pride is is very obvious. William mentions it, you know, it's it's the first scene of the movie really kind of shows it. Caleb obviously has got lust going on, but I think this Redditor mentions that Mercy has wrath as as her sin, uh, which is kind of interesting considering the fact that she's called Mercy, right? Um, but I think that she's like you mentioned a jerk. She's a really kind of a jerk of a kid, and kids can sometimes be jerks, and she just always wants to get back at her sister. Um so I guess I could see it.

SPEAKER_00 35:15

Good call. Yeah, I didn't uh I didn't catch that at first, but now that I think about it, that's uh that's a perfect fit.

SPEAKER_01 35:21

They also mentioned uh for Jonah Sloth uh because he appears to not really do much for the film um and does you know not really adding much to the life at the farm there in terms of chores and everything. Uh but he apparently there's some kind of reference to Jonah from the Bible. I don't know enough about that story to really make the connection. Envy as as a uh as a sin for Catherine, which I guess I could kind of I could kind of see because like you know, she's got envy for her own daughter, which is disturbing. But I think the one that really kind of like blew my brain up was original sin for Samuel because it's the easiest one, right? It's a baby. What sin could there be? And for them it's the original sin. But this red editor also then links um greed and gluttony to Thomason, which is I don't know, is that fair? Is it not fair? I'm not sure.

SPEAKER_00 36:13

I don't know if that's fair. I'd have to I I can't put I can't place it, but maybe I'm missing something.

SPEAKER_02 36:19

Hmm. Uh Thomason is being the only sane person in her family. How greedy of her.

SPEAKER_00 36:25

Yeah, and that's where I'm at, right? Like I felt like Thomason really, you know, was I don't know if you would say innocent through and through, right? I don't think I don't know if that's the right way to describe her, but um greed, I or in gluttony, I'm not sure about that. That's a that's a tough one. I feel like um I feel like everything that happened to Thomason was the direct result of her family.

SPEAKER_02 36:52

Yeah, it's tough. I mean, the the sin angle is a really, really interesting one that was completely lost on me when watching the movie. And I think that's really beautiful to just see how many layers there are there. When I was experiencing this and looking at just Thomason's life and how she's kind of one of the linchpins in this family. Sure, everyone is pitching in and you know, doing their share to keep the homestead going, but to see where she is as the oldest child who is also almost like a young mother of sorts to her younger siblings, to see how much of a burden that places on the oldest sibling is one interesting to see in how that like manifests in Thomason, but then two, to see almost what we had in Halloween ends, where we see nurtured evil versus natural evil. So again, we have Black Philip, uh, we have these whispers to the other children, but then we see Thomason who is looking for love, who wants to be loved, who is just trying to do her part, who is trying to keep the family together, who feels tremendous guilt over baby Samuel and what happens in the beginning of the movie. And we see how she's slowly exiled from her own family, and even who she appears to have one of the closest relationships with, with her father, to even see that moment where he it seems like he's gonna comfort her, and then he just demands that she confesses. To see the heartbreak there was so painful and just gutting.

SPEAKER_01 38:26

They do a really good job of showing such an interesting reaction to that situation because there's obviously some time that's passed, and we're all expecting that everyone is just gonna be really gloomy and down, but like the dad is just like so 1600's about it. He's just like, This sucks. I have to keep going. My family will die if I don't get them food. Come on, sudden, let's kill a rabbit or something. And all of us are just like, oh guys, like take a moment, deal with the fact that you have this loss in your life, you know, help each other. But no, I mean, this is like literally if they don't get something other than corn with fungus on it, they're about to die.

SPEAKER_00 38:58

Yeah, this dude just should have never left the settlement. Let's be honest. Like this guy, come on, just uh that's the whole thing right here. Like, we can all just point it all the way back to him at the very beginning. Like, if he didn't uh if he if he just sucked up his pride, everything would be good. They'd be in the settlement, you know, uh just living a normal life and and having a good time.

SPEAKER_02 39:18

Again, classic dad moves his family into a house they can't afford, but now they've dumped all the savings into it, but also there's ghosts. So sorry, family, you're all gonna die because of it.

SPEAKER_01 39:28

You're not wrong. I think that shot of Thomason from from the first like major scene of the movie that's also, of course, in the trailer where she realizes that the baby is now missing, is it's everything. It's everything about this movie. That reaction, her like looking, running off into the woods and everything. Because they're like her mom kind of imagines that she's like, Oh, well, I guess I'll keep going. But you kind of see it in her that like she is so struck with disbelief and like run towards the woods. She won't go in, of course, because they told her not to, but like she cares about what's going on. She also doesn't want to be sold off to some random family, of course, but like she just wants to do whatever the right thing is supposed to be in the moment, like keep going, make it through this horrible existence that they're going through.

SPEAKER_02 40:12

Yeah, and you know, for as much as I thought the twins were little assholes and I really didn't care for them, it's amazing to me looking back and experiencing this and feeling this throughout the movie, how much I cared for every member of the family, but just because of the shitty hand that they were dealt and having to battle every step of the way. And the moment that I felt the most empathy was when we had those kids listening to their parents' argument and the parents being foolish enough to think that they were sleeping just because they didn't respond, but then to see the look on their faces, to hear their parents arguing and fighting and realizing that they won't make it through the winter, that they're going to have to have Thomas and serve another family, so to speak. It was tragic. And I think about those moments where you grow up and you hear your parents fighting and like maybe you don't even understand what's going on, but then you're a kid and you're distracted by your video games, but like, no, these kids were serious as fuck. They were all of age to understand how much everything was falling apart around them. And while the twins could play with Black Philip and just try to find some moments of joy, Caleb and Thomas and could not. And that was devastating.

SPEAKER_00 41:25

Yeah, extremely relatable what you just said, right? Like that moment where they're all listening in. Like I feel like everyone's been there in some sense, listening at the top of the stairs or listening, you know, across the hall or whatever it is about something serious, whether it's about you or you're just interested in what they're talking about. But yeah, like it's super relatable that moment.

SPEAKER_01 41:45

It does kind of show that Caleb had to be an adult before he was ready to be an adult. And he obviously was not ready to make the decisions that he had to make. When when he decides in the middle of the night, I'm gonna get up early and and I'm gonna go fix this, I'm gonna solve this. Like, he wasn't ready to do that. That was way too much responsibility put upon him. And Thomason, I mean, the girl can't do anything right for them. No matter what she does, it's the wrong thing. Oh, like even if she's you know, like, well, hey, watch after the kids. I'm trying and they won't listen to me because one, I'm not their mother. They're just like, Yeah, whatever. You obviously didn't try hard enough.

SPEAKER_02 42:18

Oh, and that moment where she she asks for her mother to find favor in her, and her mom's like, I will if you just tell me. And then we had that moment where William confesses to selling the cup, and in that brief moment, she's ready to welcome Thomason back. But then how easily she cast her aside as soon as the little brats accuse her of being a witch. It it shows that no matter how much love there was in this family, that love became very fickle in the face of all the grief and the stress that they didn't know how to manage effectively in their home. You know, and considering how perfect or imperfect this movie may be. It's really just a big old bummer, and that might be the worst part of it. And I don't even mean that in a bad way. This movie is so beautiful, it's so poignant and so impactful. And you know what? If I could feel it just 2% less sad, I rewatch this movie more frequently than I currently can.

SPEAKER_01 43:12

I'm I'm torn because the whole baby scene was a lot, and so it is kind of the worst part of the movie to me. But if if you know, if I play nice and I pick another thing about it, I think it's this the the flying at the end. It kind of got cheesy for me. It even hey, there's other movies from A24 that feature something like this. It's cheesy from from them too. I just like if you're just gonna like float off and like feel so happy and and whatever, I don't know, it just like show it a different way because it's it's so it's so bad.

SPEAKER_02 43:45

Was that little broomstick I saw her hovering on? It was quite funny.

SPEAKER_00 43:49

Golden snitch. Yeah, there was a somewhat of a broomstick or something for sure. The worst part of the movie for me for sure was the dog dying. Obviously, like no one wants to see that. Like it was bad enough to hear the dog dying, let alone seeing it mutilated in the woods like that. That's gotta be the worst part. But I gotta say, what a fucked up time to live. I mean, honestly. Uh this really sheds light on the power that men had back then, right? The fear and danger that like women went through for centuries. Again, like I I alluded to before, the misogyny and and all of that that ultimately led to such events like the Salem witch trials that came some years after this, and and specifically how difficult it was to prove your innocence and almost always resulting in death upon doing so. It's a catch 22.

SPEAKER_02 44:37

Real bummer of a time, once again. Again, you know, I mentioned in in my worst part, there is very little wrong with this movie. It is memorable, it is powerful, it is emotional in a lot of ways, without being so emotional that it makes me break down and cry. I do think I need some space and time before I watch it again, but it's certainly worthy of a rewatch, if not for anything but then to make sense of the fucking bird pecking that woman's nipple. That is disgusting. How can you not rewatch a movie that has that?

SPEAKER_01 45:10

Oh my gosh. Well, I think this also deserves a place in my folk horror arsenal. I don't know how soon I'll get a chance to get to it, but I'm I'm not averse to it. You know, I I think there's just something about this genre, it's like so dark and so gloomy, but on like a rainy day, it kind of like fits perfectly.

SPEAKER_00 45:30

Yeah, this movie definitely has rewatchability for sure. I I don't know if I'll be watching it again anytime soon, but I do think that it's a great film. Um, I definitely, now that we've talked about like the similarities in some in some ways to Midsummar with that scene, right? I definitely feel like this fits in with some other films, such as Midsumar, that a lot of people really enjoyed without being big fans of the horror genre itself. So I can see myself watching this with friends that are looking for a good horror film uh that don't really resonate with slashers or other more conventional horror films that we have come to expect over the years. But yeah, I I I'm sure I'll I'll find my uh way back to this film at some point.

SPEAKER_02 46:16

While we're all open to re-watching this at some point in the future, let's see if we can keep a candle lit for it with Max Factor Fiction.

SPEAKER_01 46:23

Number one. Director Robert Eckers meant for the film to be interpreted as allegory, but Tess audiences continued to take it only literally, so subtleties were amplified to make his message clearer.

SPEAKER_00 46:34

Hmm, I want to say I can kind of see that. I'll go fact.

SPEAKER_01 46:37

Nice. This one is actually a fiction. The plot was meant to be taken literally, but there are small things that they scatter throughout the film that like might let viewers come up with non-witchy reasons for the madness that's on the screen. One of those favorite things is like everyone talks about the corn and how there's like a fungus on the corn that can cause hallucinations and all that kind of stuff. So I really like that.

SPEAKER_00 46:56

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 46:57

Number two, Anya Taylor Joy and Harvey Scrimshaw, who plays Caleb, wore green bodysuits, which allowed the visual effects team to CGI them into appearing naked.

SPEAKER_00 47:05

Ooh, I'm gonna go fact. That seems like, I don't know, they're they're young. I don't know, maybe that sounds like uh let's let's not have them naked on film.

SPEAKER_01 47:14

This one is also a fiction. Instead, though, they wore tightly fitting underwear that could be digitally removed. Number three, Black Phillip was supposed to appear way more in the film, but Charlie the goat wasn't quite trained well enough to make that happen.

SPEAKER_00 47:27

Uh, this one I feel like I'm gonna go fiction because I think we saw just enough of this goat. But I'm probably gonna fail at this whole thing.

SPEAKER_01 47:37

Uh, you know, honestly, this one is actually a fact. So he was difficult and aggressive and even hospitalized Ralph Innison, causing him to continue filming on painkillers. He said he was horrible. Really, really horrible. From the moment we set eyes on each other, it was just kind of hate at first sight. He had two modes, chilling out and doing nothing, or attacking me. The director said, You can't train a goat, the goat was a fucking nightmare.

SPEAKER_00 48:01

Hey, Black Philip in his purest form.

SPEAKER_02 48:04

Legend has it, the goat was more of a dick than the kids were.

SPEAKER_01 48:07

Number four. Robert Eggers was a stickler for authenticity, going so far as to CGI out Anya Taylor Joy's earring holes.

SPEAKER_00 48:16

I hope this is a fact because he went off of historical documents and wanted to really be true to the time period, but we'll see.

SPEAKER_01 48:25

So this one's a fiction, but he wishes he did. It's like the one thing that bothers him about the film. He even admitted though, maybe that's getting kind of insane.

SPEAKER_00 48:33

Hmm.

SPEAKER_01 48:34

I didn't notice them, but apparently in HD, like, it was driving him nuts.

SPEAKER_00 48:38

I didn't notice those at all. But I agree with him. He should have paid more attention.

SPEAKER_01 48:42

And number five, Anya Taylor Joy thought her performance in her first feature film was horrible and that she would never work again.

SPEAKER_00 48:49

See if I can get one of these right. I want to say fact because most people don't like their own performances.

SPEAKER_01 48:55

This one is a fact. She said, I thought I'd never work again, and I still get shivers thinking about it. It was just the worst feeling of I have let the people down I love most in the world. I didn't do it right. Nice. And look at how well they did. What a stunning performance. And that's been fact or fiction.

SPEAKER_02 49:10

Well, there you have it, folks. A stunning performance indeed, because the witch has earned a universal slash. Now we certainly had a robust discussion here, but it doesn't end here by any means. We want to know what you think. You can join in on the conversation by hanging out with us for free over in our Discord. Click the link in our show notes to sign up.

SPEAKER_01 49:27

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SPEAKER_00 49:46

Don't go into the woods at night, or you might just get bewitched.