The Witch (2015)

The Witch: Directed by Robert Eggers. With Anya Taylor-Joy, Ralph Ineson, Kate Dickie, Harvey Scrimshaw. A family in 1630s New England is torn apart by the forces of witchcraft, black magic, and possession.

“The late and sorely missed Cheryl Smith stars as Lila, the lovely pubescent daughter of a notorious gangster, who is being fostered by a kind-hearted minister. Unaware of her fatheru0026#39;s whereabouts and concerned for his well-being, she receives a letter indicating that he lays ailing in a mapped location, and should she choose to visit him, then she must do so alone. Thus begins Lilau0026#39;s dark odyssey…from the minute she steps away from the familiar safety of her front door, her nest of childhood innocence is given way to a bleak and frightening world fraught with drunks, strumpets, and lecherous men…but a corporeity of a far more uncanny and sinister nature awaits her at her journeyu0026#39;s end…the mysterious letter she received was a siren-song luring her to the incommunicado home of Lemora, a vampiress with an appetence for the blood of youths. This ancient, statuesque creature resides with her cackling old charlady and a mottle of emaciated children in a dark swampland where savage ghouls prowl the night. u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eThe bizarre nexus ensuingly forged between Lemora and Lila is simultaneously horrific and erotically charged…the small-framed, willowy Lila futilely resisting, though apprehensively drawn to, the imposing and mysterious Lemora. Itu0026#39;s an arousing u0026#39;butch/femmeu0026#39; dynamic which works well, and is illustrated more intricately than most examples of the gratis lesbiana inclusive to vampire cinema. u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eAn artfully executed celestial nightmare with subtexts touching on religious hypocrisy and elegiac loss of innocence, LEMORA demonstrates perfectly how integrity, creativity, and resourcefulness can compensate heartily for dearth of funds in a motion picture production.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eSuperior. 9/10.”