Disturbing

Rating: 9/10 (23 March 2016)

The Witch is Robert Eggers' directorial debut, he also wrote the film. It tells the story of a family that is banned from New England and moves into a farm in the middle of nowhere in the 17th century. There, they start to experience weird things as there may or may not be a witch causing trouble nearby. I'll just start off by saying I really liked The Witch, but I think a lot of people will be disappointed in the movie because it's really not a conventional horror film.
In all honesty, parts of the first act kind of bored me. There were parts in the beginning of the film where the movie does slow down a lot and I actually nearly fell asleep. But that's where I realized this movie was more about the characters than the actual witch. It's a film about this struggling religious family and how they react to this certain type of situation. Even if the first act was pretty slow and I didn't know where it was all going, nearing the second act of the film, all of the third act and especially the ending was amazing. It is a movie filled with tension, every scene is filled with it. You feel like something could happen at any moment.
There are many things in the movie that just blew me away: the directing is brilliant, the cinematography is beautiful and surprisingly, the acting was spectacular, especially from Anya- Taylor Joy who plays Thomasin, the main character. Her performance is brilliant and I really hope to see her in more films in the future. The score is haunting and really fits the movie's tone and the editing is pretty unconventional and I loved it. The editing lets you in at take a peek at the horrific things happening, but it never gives away too much information and it really is a prime example that the things you don't see are more terrifying than the things you do see.
One of the things I really liked about the movie was that it felt pretty real and accurate. It's a very good depiction of the 17th century I believe and one thing in there that was great was the dialogue. Everyone speaks in old English. You know, like "How art thou this morning?" And things like that made the film feel real. The dialogue is kind of hard to follow but I can't really say that's a negative because it's built into the fabric of the film and how it wants to be more realistic.
The last act and the ending is some of the best horror I have seen in years, maybe even ever. It's so gripping and tense and I just felt dirty and disturbed after watching it. It got under my skin in the best way, I thought the Witch was terrifying. However, like I said I think most mainstream movie-goers will be disappointed in the film, because there are no unnecessary jump scares and the movie moves pretty slowly.
Besides from a few boring parts, I loved the Witch. It's a brilliantly crafted film, tonally perfect and scary as hell, too. One other thing I really liked is that this movie features some blood and gore at parts but it was never like violence for the sake of violence. The violent parts of the movie were there because the story needed it.
8.5/10