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Witches. They’re real, and they hate children!
In a world where witches are evil monsters who inexplicably hate children, Grandma (Octavia Spencer) takes in her grandson (Jahzir Bruno) after his parents pass away from a car accident. After a realising that there is a witch in town, Grandma quickly relocates her small family to a grand hotel, which is also, unfortunately, hosting an annual get-together with all of England’s witches, headed by Anne Hathaway’s Grand High Witch.
Based upon the 1983 novel by Roald Dahl, The Witches is directed by the legendary, Robert Zemeckis, with a screenplay by Kenya Barris, Guillermo del Toro, and Zemeckis. With a surefire team behind the camera and many accomplished actors in front, The Witches seems like a certified hit — sadly, it is not.
Originally set for a cinema release, The Witches was removed from the Warner Bros. schedule due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and instead placed on their new HBO Max streaming service in the US, and available for rental elsewhere. This move was certainly the right choice because The Witches very much feels like it was destined to be streamed rather than seen on the big screen.
That’s not to say that The Witches is bad, but it’s only really worth one watch because it brings nothing of interest to the table, especially when compared to the 1990 version. While the production values are better than the Angelica Huston version, this new adaptation leans far-too heavily on CGI, which is passable at best. The effects that bring the talking mice to life are particularly bad, and the fact that we spend a large majority of the film with them doesn’t help, even if your eyes eventually get used to them.
Anne Hathaway plays the Grand High Witch, the leader of all of the witches of the world, and she does her best as the potion-making villainess, but sadly, it’s often hard to look past her clunky digitally-enhanced makeup, even if they are among the best effects in the whole movie, and this problem also extends to the other witches as well. When you can look past the often awkward effects, the witches as a whole are interesting, intimidating, and frighteningly fun.
Hathaway may be billed as the star, but she is overshadowed by fellow Academy Award-winner, Octavia Spencer who is captivating, funny, and all-round fantastic and extremely lovable. There is a high chance that you’ll finish the film wishing that she was your grandma too.
It’s hard to be give the worst performance in a movie when you’re the narrator, but Chris Rock certianly found a way! All the way through he narrates with an extremly put-on “old man” voice that takes away from the scene whenever he speaks. Rock’s perfomance aside, the narrator is mostly unnecessary and is only really there to give an exposition-heavy introduction to the witches themselves, as well as set-up the final scene (which plays over the beginning of the credits for some reason).
Many will be wondering whether The Witches is suitable for children because the 1990 adaptation is notorious for its scary imagery, and to be truthful, this is something that you will have to decide for yourself. Personally, I don’t see an issue with children watching the film considering it’s much, much tamer than the first adaptation, but maybe sit and watch it with your young ones if you’re concerned.
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