The Witch is Just Fantastic Cinema

The Witch should be experienced whether one is a film enthusiast or not.

I missed Robert Eggers' The Witch in theaters when it first came out in 2015, primarily owing to shoddy promotion. While the trailers are artistically designed, they still give me the impression that the film was frenetic in nature, and this is because the studio wanted to sell the film as your average horror film with cheap jump scares and gore so that younger audiences could force their parents to give them their evening pocket money so that they could watch a horror film with their friends and scream, spill drinks, and bother other audience members.

Years passed, and I continued to read about Eggers because his name and artistic perspective kept cropping up in my searches online. So I did some research on Eggers and discovered that, as a filmmaker, he conducted extensive study to recreate 1630s New England on a $4 million budget. Speaking of budgets, this arthouse picture grossed $40 million at the box office. And that isn't even the only outstanding aspect of the picture.

If you watch The Witch, you will get the impression that it is not a $4 million production. That's something I admire. Go low-budget while making it appear like a $100 million project. However, you must be an exceptional filmmaker. It will always be determined by your abilities rather than your financial situation. I can think of hundreds of big-budget movies that look utterly dreadful. However, this is not the case with Eggers, who has always had a vision and a distinct point of view. Prior to his filmmaking debut with The Witch, he worked for years as a theatrical designer, where he was able to design the sets and costumes. He once stated that he loves costumes very much and that for Christmas he asked for costumes, not toys, as a kid. That kind of approach demonstrates Eggers' level of involvement as an artist when it comes to making films.

So, as a privileged film enthusiast, I set my ego aside and decided to give The Witch a chance some time in 2018. I purchased the Blu-ray and hoped for the best. It was Friday evening, after work. I turned down the lights, inserted the disc into my Blu-ray player, and turned on the Bose home theater system. The picture started, and I was immediately transported to another epoch. Believe it or not, every time I watch the film with my father, as soon as it concludes, he comments, "We just traveled to another era," as if.

As a cinephile, I love the opportunity to introduce others to great films. I can confidently state that 95% of the time I watch good films, whether they are American or not. This is because I conduct extensive research on the film and the filmmaker beforehand. This may sound egotistic, but I can't help it because it makes me very happy to be able to persuade someone to watch outstanding cinema. The Witch is fantastic cinema, and when my father comments that every time he views the picture, it feels like he's gone to another age, it implies that I didn't waste his time, and more significantly, Eggers did not waste our time.

I hope Eggers has the opportunity to read this piece, and if he wants to speak with me, that would be fantastic because I'd want to go into detail with him because not only is the film fantastic, but it would be nice to take notes from him as a writer.

The Witch excels in dialogue, acting, set and costume design, sound, cinematography, and score. It's a straightforward story with nothing too complex. However, beneath its subtext are deeper conflicts with deeper meanings that will spark lengthy discussions. It is classified as horror, but I prefer the term psychological. It is considered slow given its pace, although not as slow as Tarr or Tarkovsky films. However, several parts of the film make me think Tarr was also on site.

The picture does not haunt you; rather, it shakes you because of its deviousness or the way it was designed. It grows on you. It hits you abruptly from a different aspect, and by the third act, you've evolved. There's nothing horrifying about it. It suggests the filmmaker was successful. McTiernan's Predator, Anderson's There Will Be Blood and The Master, Tarantino's Once Upon a Time in… Hollywood, and Shyamalan's The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable have all made me feel the same way. It's simply a distinct experience because of the genre and style. Interstellar is a cinematic experience that is just as great as the Blade Runner films.

The Witch should be experienced whether one is a film enthusiast or not. Who knows, it might alter you and cause you to fall in love with cinema. There's nothing wrong with that. It's a good feeling. As Truffaut once said, “film lovers are sick people.” I love this sickness.