March 25th in Chicago. What do you day after a half day of work on Good Friday? Why see a film with Satanic undertones of course. This film had a lot of buzz around it and it was well received. It got a 90% Rotten Tomatoes rating and the trailer seemed interesting. The film takes place in Puritanical New England in the 1600's. The film opens with a trial of sorts where William is banished from the community for "prideful conceit." He and his family are forced to hack it out in the woods (the woods are never a good place to be in modern times so in the 17th century, you're days are numbered). William and his family: pregnant wife Katherine, daughter Thomasin (the oldest), oldest son Caleb, twins Mercy and Jonas, manage to find a nice clearing in the forest and is able t make a home there. Samuel is born and while Thomasin is playing peek-a-boo with him, he disappears. It wasn't like they were playing peek-a-boo from a block away, she was standing over him. Gone.
While the family blames a wolf for taking Samuel and prays for his return, he meets a bad fate at the hands of a crazy naked lady. Katherine is devastated by Samuel's disappearance and she slowly stats to lose it and eventually blames Thomasin. Caleb and Thomasin go out hunting one morning and during some commotion, Thomasin is thrown from her horse. Caleb finds that their do has been killed and is captured by a crazy naked lady. Thomasin makes it back to the house and there's no Caleb. Katherine has now completely lost it and has it in for Thomasin. Caleb, naked and in a bad way, makes it back to the farm. Turns out he's possessed and eventually dies. Katherine with the help of the twins, points the witchcraft finger at Thomasin. Thomasin denies everything but gets locked up in the barn with the twins and their creepy goat Black Phillip.
Not sure how they didn't finger Black Phillip as Satan. It's all right in front their eyes for crying out loud!
When William opens up the barn in the morning to find that the twins are missing, the livestock are dead (except for Black Phillip, given) and Thomasin with bloody hands. Unsurprisingly, things get worse from there. The film ends with a naked Thomasin joining a coven of naked witches in the woods.
The film was the directorial debut of Robert Eggers. He also wrote the film based on old timey New England folklore and fairy tales. The film is more creepy than scary. It's a decent into madness film (which I dig). The family slowly starts to lose it, being isolated in the woods with weird sh*t happening to them. There's some real creepy imagery as well. The scene where Samuel is in the witch's clutches is disturbing and there's a scene where Katherine dreams that Samuel has returned and she begins to breast feed him. Suffice to say it wasn't Samuel that was breast feeding and it wasn't a dream. That image really creeped me out! It creeped me out so much my wife still makes fun of me about it. THe film is only 90 minutes and it gets right to the point. Eggers does a real nice job ratcheting up the tension until the climactic ending.
The only problem I had with the film is that I don't believe that William and his family would've lived long enough to have all this misfortune happen to them. I just didn't believe they'd survive the Winter in tact as a family unit considering they had nothing when they were banished. Otherwise this was a nice little film that is worthy watching if you dig creepy movies.
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