The Witch - an original and creative 'horror' movie

What an absolutely joy it was to watch this stripped-back supernatural thriller.  Written and directed by the completely unknown Robert Eggers, The Witch is set in 17th century rural New England and tells a tale of a puritan family who are expelled from their community and try to live off the land by themselves.  The family are a God-fearing bunch, typical perhaps of the time, with patriarch William (played by Ralph Ineson - who was also Finchy in The Office) opening the film admonishing the elders of their exiled village for being insufficiently pious.  Notions of religion, righteousness and fear are foreboded to be strong themes throughout.

The opening scene of the family going alone shows eldest daughter Thomasin (Anna Taylor-Joy) playing with her young baby brother.  She closes her eyes for a moment, and when she reopens them baby Sam has vanished.  She looks to the woods beyond as the autumn air blows eerily around her, what force could have taken her brother?

For the next 70 minutes the film tells a story that's almost-but-not-quite a straight horror thriller with a devilish coven of witches preying on the innocence of these pioneers.  Almost, but not quite.  The overt super-naturalism of the film is expertly portrayed so as to always permit rational explanation to the outside observer.  Much much more so than a traditional horror thriller ever would.  We are shown a witch luring a teenage boy in the woods.  But are we?  Teenage boys' minds do think in a certain way.  Certain creatures are possessed and act as if supernaturally powerful - but are we seeing this, or are we seeing this through the eyes of a witchcraft-obsessed 17th century peasant?  Seen like this the film is as much exploration of 17th century attitudes to religion, fear of witchcraft, fear of sexuality, repression and stress as it is a horror movie.  Even the film's final 5 minutes - which when seen as a straight depiction of events surely confirms the horror of what has passed before it - are only seen from one point of view.  This is the point of view of a repressed 17th century peasant convinced of the existence of witches and their own piousness before god.  Why wouldn't they see the world like that?

I hope you can tell that I really enjoyed this film.  If it was just the story thought it wouldn't quite be enough to rave as much as I am.  The experience of the film comes from so many elements coming together.  Everything is beautifully lit with natural light.  The framing is as much a part of the storytelling as anything, as we try to separate out what we are being told through the eyes of the characters and what is 'real'.  Even the soundtrack works.  And it really shouldn't when you think about what it is.  If you were ask you to make a slightly lame ghost noise, I bet you would make a noise that's not far from the sound the carries over many of the otherworldly shots of the barren New England forest.  It shouldn't work, but in the context of everything else it works perfectly.

Though the film deals with occult subject matter and is on the surface about witches and demons and the like, it only has a 15 rating.  That's reasonable as at no point are there any jump scares and blood is kept to a minimum.  It's all about atmosphere, lighting, space, mist, austerity and fear of the unknown.  As a non-traditional horror film I would recommend it even to people who perhaps shy away from scary movies.  Really quite happy to have kicked my 2017 in film off with this little gem from 2016.