After scaring its way through Sundance (where it won Best Director in the US Narrative Competition) and other festivals – the film is on its way to Toronto next month – Robert Eggers’ The Witch is headed to cinemas next year. The first trailer for the period horror movie has now crept online.
The stylish, haunting drama is set in New England in 1630, where William (Ralph Ineson) and Katherine’s (Kate Dickie) strictly devout life sees them largely shunned by their fellow colonials. The family moves to a remote plot of land on the edge of a forest rumoured to be controlled by witches and that’s when strange things start to happen. Animals turn against them, crops fail, and one of their children disappears, only to be returned seemingly possessed by evil spirits.
As paranoia and recrimination rise, fingers point at the couple’s teenage daughter Thomasin (Anya Taylor-Joy), who is accused of witchcraft even as the family begins to fall apart and finds both their love and faith tested.
Eggers, who wrote and directed, made the leap from working on short films and serving in the art, production design and costume departments of other movies, bringing his keen eye for visuals to the film, and giving it a genuinely unnerving feel. There’s no word on when it’ll hit screens either in the US or over here, but expect it some time in 2016.