I saw THE WITCH in the second week of its release and I found it one of the best films I've seen since the end of the 1990s. However, as has been widely discussed in various online forums, it's really more of a cult historical drama with some very strange and suspenseful themes rather than a "horror movie" as such. Apparently, when folk now hear the words "horror movie," they expect some kind of two hour parade of corpse-grinding ghoulishness with lots of spatter, gore, and lovingly detailed physical mutilation.
THE WITCH could be described to a DS fan as spending 90 minutes inside the world of Reverend Trask... and learning about the consequences.
Another feature of the film is that the dialogue is spoken in reconstructed Pilgrim era English (generally treated as a form of Yorkshire dialect). Every line was reportedly collaged by the author/director from a 17th century source connected with various trials and investigations into the Witchcraft hysteria of the period.
G.
