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FreudianSlippers
Apr 12, 2010

Shooting and Fucking
are the same thing!

What I took away from the film is the reason she was never directly targeted by the witch is because Satan was trying to frame her so she had no other option to become a witch and that this was probably even standard practice for witch recruitment.

FreudianSlippers fucked around with this message at 20:14 on Mar 8, 2016

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JonathonSpectre
Jul 23, 2003

I replaced the Shermatar and text with this because I don't wanna see racial slurs every time you post what the fuck

Soiled Meat

Magic Hate Ball posted:

She was also stranded way out in the wilderness, so her options were either to join the flying witch circus or get lost and die trying to find her way back to the puritan fort.

I read it as she had seen the complete and utter failure of Christianity in every way, everyone in the family just praying as hard as they could and trying to be as pure as the driven snow which of course resulted in Samuel disappearing, Caleb dying horribly, Dad getting eviscerated by a goat and dying under a pile of wood, her mother going apeshit and trying to kill her and her having to (quite horrifically) stab her mother to death, and basically everyone's life getting loving destroyed in the most brutal, psychologically awful way possible while this "Christ" everyone was constantly babbling on about was too busy judging people's sex lives or something to help out. With all that coming about as a result of prayer, clean livin', and church, the decision to jump ship was probably pretty simple even if she'd had a prepper cabin next door full of canned beets and lifestraws and poo poo.

It's like a Jets fan who finally realizes Hey, there are other teams, and they actually win... wait I can cheer for one of them?!?! SIGN ME UP!

BTW I saw it as a happy ending :colbert: Hail Black Phillip, our horny master.

1stGear
Jan 16, 2010

Here's to the new us.
Someone earlier mentioned they thought it was going to be a telling of the Book of Job and it kinda is only this time Satan wins the bet.

sticklefifer
Nov 11, 2003

by VideoGames
Bleak, slow-burning doom horror is extremely my poo poo, so I loved this (and if anyone can recommend more, get at me). I wouldn't really call it "horror" per se, more in the vein of supernatural period drama or very dark fantasy. When this becomes available at home I would love to watch it as a double feature with Sauna. I went in expecting that same kind of vibe from The Witch and it delivered.

My theater's audience was stone quiet, though it was a matinee so it wasn't very packed. I'm thankful for that because the film relies a lot on quiet. I highly recommend seeing it at a low-volume time of day and not going to a major mall theater. I really liked the camera work; they did a lot of lingering shots and movements that were really effective. The atmosphere and the acting were especially superb. Everyone was on point, even the little kids. I was particularly impressed by Caleb's actor. He's got a lot of range and I hope he catches on. He completely nailed that whole rapture and death scene. I'm loving all the interpretations of the characters and the ending in this thread too. There's a lot of subtlety that I realize more as I analyze it further. This has really stuck with me the last few days.

Mike N Eich
Jan 27, 2007

This might just be the year

Capntastic posted:

The characters in the film and their actions had almost no bearing on the motives of the antagonist (witches, the literal satan) and thus the first hour and a half is almost entirely wasted in terms of plot advancement no matter how much character-building, setting-building, tension-building, etc-building went on.

The characters could have lived in perfect idyllic harmony and then the last 20 minutes has Black Phillip goring people and the cackling witch, and so on.

And then all the witches float around at the end. Spooky but meaningless to anyone not versed in the minutiae of "real witch lore", and an almost tacked on ending.

The family would have been doomed but its not about them, its about recruiting Thomasin to the coven. The witches have the power to murder the entire family whenever they wanted to, that wasn't their goal, their goal was to get the entire family to turn on her and have her willingly join them. Thats why they engineered events in the way they did.

Magic Hate Ball posted:

She was also stranded way out in the wilderness, so her options were either to join the flying witch circus or get lost and die trying to find her way back to the puritan fort.

But remember we are talking about people who believe very earnestly in heaven and hell. See how desperate and terrified Caleb is when he questions his father about whether or not Samuel is in hell, knowing what that may say to him. Thomasin is presented with the real choice to die, with the potential of salvation, or definitively walk down the path of damnation.

Mike N Eich fucked around with this message at 06:07 on Feb 29, 2016

my kinda ape
Sep 15, 2008

Everything's gonna be A-OK
Oven Wrangler
I liked this a lot even though it was a really slow burner. Unfortunately I saw it with my idiot friend who has basically the worst taste in movies out of any human alive so naturally he HATED it and wouldn't shut the gently caress up. I mean I could easily see how someone couldn't like this but he hated Fury Road and loves poo poo like Paul Blart: Mall Cop, why do I keep going to movies with him???

my kinda ape fucked around with this message at 09:20 on Feb 29, 2016

Mulva
Sep 13, 2011
It's about time for my once per decade ban for being a consistently terrible poster.

JonathonSpectre posted:

I read it as she had seen the complete and utter failure of Christianity in every way

Devil ain't Buddhist son, and a win for Satan is a win for Judeo-Christianity. Maybe not the most traditional win, but a win is a win :colbert:

Mike N Eich
Jan 27, 2007

This might just be the year

Boogaleeboo posted:

Devil ain't Buddhist son, and a win for Satan is a win for Judeo-Christianity. Maybe not the most traditional win, but a win is a win :colbert:

Is it though? There's no presence of God or anything holy in this movie. Is there a Heaven? Maybe the witches and Black Phillip are the manifestation of some gnostic spirituality, and aren't connected to Judeo-Christian mythology at all.

eSporks
Jun 10, 2011

I don't see how you can think the witches deliberately manipulated the family to recruit thomasin, there is no evidence for it. That may have been the intent of the movie, but it was not demonstrated.
The only time a witch is shown to act with any intent at all is when the baby gets stolen

The way things were portrayed, the family would have outcast thomasin with 0 influence from the witch. A lot of people are looking at the lack of a plot and filling that empty space to make the movie seem as though it wasn't so empty.

alnilam
Nov 10, 2009

eSporks posted:

I don't see how you can think the witches deliberately manipulated the family to recruit thomasin, there is no evidence for it. That may have been the intent of the movie, but it was not demonstrated.
The only time a witch is shown to act with any intent at all is when the baby gets stolen

The way things were portrayed, the family would have outcast thomasin with 0 influence from the witch. A lot of people are looking at the lack of a plot and filling that empty space to make the movie seem as though it wasn't so empty.

This is like postmodern literary theory 101 and it's not a bad thing :shrug:

Mulva
Sep 13, 2011
It's about time for my once per decade ban for being a consistently terrible poster.

Mike N Eich posted:

Is it though? There's no presence of God or anything holy in this movie. Is there a Heaven? Maybe the witches and Black Phillip are the manifestation of some gnostic spirituality, and aren't connected to Judeo-Christian mythology at all.

That's an even bigger win for Christianity, because even with magic powers they are still crushing babies and living up to every single stereotype people at the time had of Satanists. If all you can do with mystical power is live out Bible fanfic with your life, God [Or lack of] drat.

1stGear
Jan 16, 2010

Here's to the new us.

ghetto wormhole posted:

but he hated Fury Road

This is grounds for justifiable homicide, FYI.

Phi230
Feb 2, 2016

by Fluffdaddy

1stGear posted:

This is grounds for justifiable homicide, FYI.

"Your Honor I submit to the bench my reasoning for the attempted murder, you see, he hated Fury Road..."

"Mediocre!"

my kinda ape
Sep 15, 2008

Everything's gonna be A-OK
Oven Wrangler

1stGear posted:

This is grounds for justifiable homicide, FYI.

"It didn't have any backstory. There was no plot!"

A True Jar Jar Fan
Nov 3, 2003

Primadonna

eSporks posted:

I don't see how you can think the witches deliberately manipulated the family to recruit thomasin, there is no evidence for it. That may have been the intent of the movie, but it was not demonstrated.
The only time a witch is shown to act with any intent at all is when the baby gets stolen

How about the scene with Caleb in the woods or the spirits coming to the mother in the form of the crow or the awful twins being in communication with Super Goat or when the mayhem in the barn happens or when the dad gets goated? And in all of this Thomasin is kept unharmed? None of that has intent behind it?

Paolomania
Apr 26, 2006

I saw an early screening of this last fall and remember thinking at the time that it must be a rough cut due to the obvious pacing, editing, and sound issues - but clearly with such attention to composition and academic detail the finished work would come together. Looks like Nope, the director was just a composition and period nerd and that was the final cut. This movie is an empty shell of beautifully composed shots and well researched witch-mythos beats strung together by an empty space where a story of manipulation and seduction by Evil should have been. The turn at the end is as nonsensical for the character as it is necessary for an audience that wants to root for the witches.

computer parts
Nov 18, 2010

PLEASE CLAP

Paolomania posted:

I saw an early screening of this last fall and remember thinking at the time that it must be a rough cut due to the obvious pacing, editing, and sound issues - but clearly with such attention to composition and academic detail the finished work would come together. Looks like Nope, the director was just a composition and period nerd and that was the final cut. This movie is an empty shell of beautifully composed shots and well researched witch-mythos beats strung together by an empty space where a story of manipulation and seduction by Evil should have been. The turn at the end is as nonsensical for the character as it is necessary for an audience that wants to root for the witches.

Out of curiosity, have you seen Meek's Cutoff, and what was your feelings about it?

Paolomania
Apr 26, 2006

computer parts posted:

Out of curiosity, have you seen Meek's Cutoff, and what was your feelings about it?

I have not, but as Rosemary's Baby was brought up before I'll say that that was a slow burn that I liked.

TrixRabbi
Aug 20, 2010

Time for a little robot chauvinism!

In talking about Thomasin being manipulated into joining the coven, no one has mentioned that she is in part complicit in her condemnation. When she tells her sister she is a witch and sells it with conviction it's the beginning of the end for her. It's something she did entirely on her own, without being coerced into it.

Paolomania
Apr 26, 2006

To be more clear, if you consider the audience's journey follow's that of Rosemary - it is one of uncertainty and self-doubt. It is not clear what is real, what is dream, what is paranoia. The slow burn comes with the increasing oddity and frequency of experience, which along with her 'illness', and the rejection of those around her, keeps the audience doubting (even if the dread is growing) right up until that last scene.

The Witch, as mentioned earlier in this thread, not only gives up the supernatural goods early, but this is a world where Thomasin does believe in Evil, she knows that Evil things stole and probably killed the baby, tortured her brother to death, and thus prodded the events that made her parents go crazy and get killed. She is portrayed throughout the movie as believing in fairness and justice in sticking up for herself and show that she actually cares for her family though they might be batshit crazy. But lo, in the end we are expected to accept that she will reject her inner sense of justice and join forces with the Evil that hosed up her life and killed everyone that she loved because the modern audience expects a story of empowering rejection of patriarchal dogma or something. Add in beautiful composition and academic research ... critics rave ... yada yada.

Trollipop
Apr 10, 2007

hippin and hoppin
I really enjoyed this movie. First thing I noticed after though, was it was definitely not "scary", but for sure it was dark and twisted. I was really captivated the entire time and felt the build up really payed off from when they pray over the son all the way til the end.

The sound mixing wasn't great and it was hard to hear some of the dialogue. Definitely would have been better in a less crowded theater. My audience was awful

MisterBibs
Jul 17, 2010

dolla dolla
bill y'all
Fun Shoe

Trollipop posted:

My audience was awful

How so?

eSporks
Jun 10, 2011

Surlaw posted:

How about the scene with Caleb in the woods or the spirits coming to the mother in the form of the crow or the awful twins being in communication with Super Goat or when the mayhem in the barn happens or when the dad gets goated? And in all of this Thomasin is kept unharmed? None of that has intent behind it?
All of that happens long after the family ripped itself apart, thomasin also got knocked out cold.

I think the whole movie is just an ergot hallucination and also that thomasin was a witch from the beginning and she is the one that poisoned everyone.

WASDF
Jul 29, 2011

eSporks posted:

All of that happens long after the family ripped itself apart, thomasin also got knocked out cold.

I think the whole movie is just an ergot hallucination and also that thomasin was a witch from the beginning and she is the one that poisoned everyone.

You can think this, but it's wrong.

A True Jar Jar Fan
Nov 3, 2003

Primadonna

eSporks posted:

All of that happens long after the family ripped itself apart
No it really doesn't. The witches/Satan act with intent throughout the movie. Those events occur in the beginning, middle, and end. It's the whole movie.

FreudianSlippers
Apr 12, 2010

Shooting and Fucking
are the same thing!

Ergot poisoning is less interesting than Satan
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=czLceBSD7Cc

Criminal Minded
Jan 4, 2005

Spring break forever
Really enjoyed (if that's the right word) this. Struck me less as a straight horror film than a film about existential and religious crisis, in a world in which nature is cruel and unforgiving and an apocalyptic undercurrent underlines the grueling misery of day-to-day existence - a la Bergman, or Cormac McCarthy, or Current 93. (I love all those artists, natch.) I wish I knew more about gnosticism, because this film seems ripe with gnostic overtones.

My only complaint: the sound mixing, combined with my cochlear implant and a lack of subtitles, made it hard to pick up on many particulars, e.g. the exchange between the oldest son and the father during the hunt, or his dying speech. I'll have to see it again, which, no problem.

sticklefifer
Nov 11, 2003

by VideoGames
It felt to me like every time we saw witches or felt the Satanic influence it was always viewed through the lens of whomever was perceiving it. When we see the witch hovering and lingering over the baby and then later bathing in its blood, that's the witch via the worst fears of a mourning parent who had their child mysteriously lost to the woods. When the twins see the stereotypical cackling witch, that's what a young child thinks a witch does, and they see Black Phillip as a friendly animal. When a pubescent boy sees the beautiful woman seducing him, that's what he wants the witch to be as a depiction of his sin of lust. When Thomasin sees a black-cloaked man who can offer her everything including freedom just after she kills her mother and has no other choice, that's what she needed to see and hear. An evil influence took the family one by one, but appeared to each of them differently and each responded to it differently. Some saw terror and others saw ecstasy.

Whether these things within the story happened as depicted or not is irrelevant; the folktale nature of the story means it was as real to the characters as God was to them.

Paolomania
Apr 26, 2006

My what an amazingly nuanced story of the seductive power of evil: flashing tits at a young boy, wooing children with a fuzzy animal, and tempting a newly orphaned young girl with delicious food. I really feel the weight of how their hubris and moral failings lead to their respective downfalls. What dreary existential implications there must be when even these characters succumb.

Battle Rockers
Aug 3, 2008

i wanna witness ur slit

Paolomania posted:

My what an amazingly nuanced story of the seductive power of evil: flashing tits at a young boy, wooing children with a fuzzy animal, and tempting a newly orphaned young girl with delicious food. I really feel the weight of how their hubris and moral failings lead to their respective downfalls. What dreary existential implications there must be when even these characters succumb.

same

DangerDongs
Nov 7, 2010

Grimey Drawer

Paolomania posted:

My what an amazingly nuanced story of the seductive power of evil: flashing tits at a young boy, wooing children with a fuzzy animal, and tempting a newly orphaned young girl with delicious food. I really feel the weight of how their hubris and moral failings lead to their respective downfalls. What dreary existential implications there must be when even these characters succumb.

I see where you are coming from, but I think the movie would of be worse off if you learned Satan boned them because the real reason papa was banished was because he raped a girl in the name of God or killed some one.

Here you have this family who is extremely religious, and the father holds himself to be higher than others, which is why, in his mind, he was kicked out of town; yet, they were so easily swayed by what you consider petty things.
The point was if there really was an evil force such as the devil it wouldn't be hard to gently caress an entire family over, because we all sin.
Or maybe his point was if there really is a Devil and a God then why couldn't evil willingly slaughter. This would make sense with the baby being taken for vitality; an infant is not capable of sin.

A True Jar Jar Fan
Nov 3, 2003

Primadonna

Babies are full of Original Sin. That's like the most sin per pound that a monster can possibly find, of course they eat them. It's like McNuggets to woods witches.

alnilam
Nov 10, 2009

Surlaw posted:

Babies are full of Original Sin. That's like the most sin per pound that a monster can possibly find, of course they eat them. It's like McNuggets to woods witches.

Not to mention the sin per time alive quantity is unrivalled.

Immortan
Jun 6, 2015

by Shine
I can't decide which movie was more terrible: The Witch or The Village.

HUNDU THE BEAST GOD
Sep 14, 2007

everything is yours

Immortan posted:

I can't decide which movie was more terrible: The Witch or The Village.

They both own.

FourLeaf
Dec 2, 2011
I loved it. Right up there with the Babadook and It Follows in terms of enjoyment for me.

Disclaimer: I don't think people who didn't like it are "too stupid to understand true horror." There have been many movies that other people have loved that Just Weren't For Me. Sometimes people are able to ignore flaws others can't; sometimes they don't even agree that they're flaws.

The only criticism I've seen that irritates me are the people saying "This movie is unfeminist/irresponsible because it's saying women really are evil." For example:

https://twitter.com/Gingerhazing/status/701916865958817792

I just don't understand viewing it this way at all. I saw this movie as an metaphor for how some people get radicalized.

Yes, in the movie universe witches are real and they commit atrocities. But that doesn't mean ALL women are secret witches. The parents' zealotry and excessive vigilance against sin, targeted at their community and then at their own daughter, end up creating the ideal circumstances for the very thing they were afraid of to actually happen. When you completely marginalize a person, or even harm them because you're terrified of what they might become, you risk giving them no other alternative.

At the end of the movie Thomasin's choices were starve to death in the wilderness, try to get back to the Puritan community who would probably torture and execute her for being a witch anyway, or just actually become a witch. I would make the same decision as her at that point.

Another issue with the "it's bad because it's saying women are evil" viewpoint is that the movie doesn't try to push the point that women are especially susceptible to sin compared to men. Just because the characters might believe women are more at risk doesn't make that the "message" of the film/filmmakers. Indeed, what the movie actually shows is that the male family members are equally tempted by evil. If the dad had admitted they couldn't survive by themselves when he first considered selling the silver cup, they would have gone back to the community, and been embarrassed but alive. Instead, his pride kept him from trying to go back until two of his children had died. And by then, it was too late for all of them. He also lies to his wife and allows his child to take the blame for his crime, further sowing family discord. And of course, there's the brother staring lustfully at his own sister as well. The men are no better.

Sorry for going on a bit of a rant but I've seen several people giving this criticism now.

FourLeaf fucked around with this message at 01:06 on Mar 5, 2016

FourLeaf
Dec 2, 2011

1stGear posted:

The witch and Satan are not the antagonists in this movie.

They are definitely antagonists, but they aren't the only antagonists, or even the most direct ones. It's like if you moved your family to live in Tornado Alley and then your new house got destroyed by a tornado. Like, you loving knew this could happen; the tornado killed you, but your decision-making also played a pretty crucial role.

Danger posted:

Caleb's ecstatic 'encounter' with Christ and Thomasin's with the coven was a really good juxtaposition.

How did I miss this? That's great.

FourLeaf fucked around with this message at 01:41 on Mar 5, 2016

Paolomania
Apr 26, 2006

I mean the real lesson here is obviously "If you conform to colony law your daughter won't turn into a baby pulper."

WeedlordGoku69
Feb 12, 2015

by Cyrano4747

I'll give you this movie, but The Village is terrible

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unlimited shrimp
Aug 30, 2008
Anyone know where the opening scene was filmed, with the proper village? Was it the Plimoth Plantation?

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