The Witch [Blu-ray]

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Short film: Brothers – a movie that was made to show he could work with a small family unit in a rural setting. This charts the problematic relationship of two siblings and their abusive grandma. One day the two boys go into the woods with rifles. As dark, tense and emotionally complex as what we’ve come to expect from Eggers. (10 minutes)

It's a curse because Kaulder has to live on eternally with the memory of his wife and daughter who were killed by the witch. This is the type of emoting that escapes a Vin Diesel performance. He's great in the Fast and Furious movies because Dominic Toretto is more, or less, Diesel. When he's called upon to offer up a bit more emotion his performances usually fall flat. That's the case here. Kaulder has a tortured past, but Diesel is unable to convey that through his emotions. So, while it may be a curse for him to live on and on with the memory of his murdered family, that sort of pain never comes across in Diesel's acting. William is trying to be as pious and strong as possible, and Katherine is straining to be away from civilisation for so long, especially after the loss of Samuel. This subsequently puts more pressure on Thomasin, who does many of the jobs around the farm including looking after the twins, who themselves resent her, which then results in her accidentally convincing them that she herself is a witch. Thomasin is also victimised by Katherine, not least because she is becoming a woman, and Katherine fears she is leading the family away from their ways to something much more sinful. The best folk horror always worked because of its sense of the normalisation of the ‘uncanny’ – how something just a little bit... ’off’ from our everyday reality can be accepted as the norm to utterly unfathomable consequences. Be it the Festival of the Sun on Summerisle, the seemingly happenstance and everyday denouncement of ordinary women by everyone in Witchfinder General and the sinister warpings of Christianity by the children in Blood on Satan’s Claw. I never caught The Last Witch Hunter on its initial theatrical release. Judging by the initial reaction I dodged a bullet. Perhaps my expectations were too low, but visiting it for the first time I must say it wasn't as horrible as I was imagining. Sure, Vin Diesel's stone-like presence isn't great for a film like this, and sure the information surrounding his abilities as a witch hunter are murky. Yet, there's enough there to hold interest, which is more than I thought would be possible.

Side guide

in evidence in the 1080p version. Selected brief moments, as in one of the first outdoor scenes where just a hint of rosy pink tones are noticeable in His handler is Dolan 36th (Michael Caine). He's the 36th person to be tasked with keeping Kaulder safe and doing his job. Caine provides some much needed acting gravitas whenever he's paired up with Diesel in a scene. At least one of them knows about subtleties in the acting profession. The "folktale" element obviously plays into this depiction, but since everything is shown more or less "realistically", there doesn't initially antithetical to some of 4K UHD's big "calling cards", namely increased resolution and highlights courtesy of HDR. As I mentioned in our original The Witch Blu-ray review, this Arri Alexa captured piece offers

Widely praised since its debut, The Witch is a slow burn film that’ll likely be a case of love-it-or-hate-it. The film is set in New England in the 17 th century and focuses on a man named William (Ralph Ineson) and his family on their plantation. A case of Prideful conceit causes the exile of William and his family. They relocate to a farm by a large forest that they built themselves. William is married and has four kids. After his wife delivers her fifth child, he mysteriously vanishes one day. It is believed that a witch has in fact abducted the child for strange purposes. After this happens, we see the family, particularly Katherine (William’s wife) struggle with the vanishing. They also have twins and we see their daily routine on the farm. One such moment involves them playing with a goat that they claim can speak. There’s also talk of witchcraft, among other things. Harvey Scrimshaw: Highlights include his apprehension about doing some of the horror scenes (like kissing an older actor), auditioning with Ralph and Anya, working with Robert Eggers, rehearsing the possession scene in a hotel, the movie’s many bugs and why he missed the premiere. (7 minutes) Second Sight Films are bringing out The Witch 4K UHD + Blu-ray Limited Edition this month in the UK. moments as the early scene introducing two of the focal children. In terms of the blue gradings, some scenes here approach a lighter teal tone than isStudios & Distributors: Parts and Labor | RT Features | Rooks Nest Entertainment | Maiden Voyage Pictures | Mott Street Pictures | Code Red Productions | Scythia Films | Pulse Films | Very Special Projects (as Special Projects) | Second Sight Films More traumas of course accrue around the family, and in the film's final act, William seems about to go Grand Guignol on his (surviving)

There's an overt reference to liturgically towing the line (in a manner of speaking) from the very first moments of The Witch, when offering much in the way of hue. While the gray and blue tones that I mentioned in my review of the 1080p Blu-ray version are still very much in BFI London Film Festival Q&A with Robert Eggers, Anya Taylor-Joy, Ralph Ineson and Producer Jay Van Hoy New England, 1630. Upon threat of banishment by the church, an English farmer leaves his colonial plantation and relocates his family to a remote plot of land on the edge of an ominous forest—within which lurks an unknown evil. Strange and unsettling things begin to happen —animals turn malevolent, crops fail, one child disappears and another seems to become possessed by an evil spirit. With suspicion and paranoia mounting, daughter Thomasin is accused of witchcraft.even outright signs of graphic gore (there are a few disturbing images in the film, but they're relatively restrained, at least within the context of its dread-dripped atmosphere, and its spiralling sense of desperation turning into inevitability, unsettles and oppresses like few genre films of recent times