Live Deliciously with the 4K Release of ‘The Witch’ (4K Ultra Review)

No film in the last decade has so profoundly affected horror the way that The Witch has. The four years since its release has seen a slew of horror come and go and yet the debut from writer/director Robert Eggers remains untouched in terms of raw power and sheer fright. To watch The Witch is to subject yourself to a master class in tension and atmosphere, where horror is earned with meticulous planning rather than cheap tricks. Jump scares have no place in the battle for the soul.

Expectations are high on Eggers, whose second feature, The Lighthouse, is set to premiere next month at Director’s Fortnight. They are, of course, expectations that he himself has set. His debut was a bar-raising endeavor whose mark on the genre is so deep that it’s yet to be entirely felt. Ten of fifteen years from now, some new director will release their first film and they will point to The Witch as the film that not only got them into horror but also got them into directing. They will not be the last to do so.

It’s near immediate ascension to the heights of the horror pantheon was neither unjust nor unwarranted. Every shot that Eggers sets-up (with cinematographer Jarin Blaschke) is a work of pure intention, designed to take us deeper into the hellish world that threatens young Thomasin (Anya Taylor-Joy) and her puritan family. The longer it continues, the more tense it becomes, until the horrifying finale at the witch’s circle as temptation finally wins over.

That’s one read, at any rate. One that tracks with the film’s insistence that it’s based on real myths from New England. Another read compels us to look at the oppression delivered unto Thomasin by her, father William (Ralph Inseon) and her family’s puritan beliefs. Applying our modern sensibilities to a work of historical fiction is always a tricky play, but it’s deliciously tempting in this case. From this standpoint, we can view The Witch as a indictment of modern religion’s continued suppression of individual rights and the drastic measures a young woman will take to free herself of her family’s, and God’s, great tyranny.

It’s rare enough to find a horror film that opens itself up to competing reads, rarer still see one that works so well regardless of how you choose to view it. Eggers established himself as a master from the film’s gorgeous opening shots and lived up to that through the film’s terrifying conclusion. In the years since I first saw The Witch, I find my mind ever turning back to the complexity of Eggers’s vision, turning the film over and thinking about it—often when I’d least like to. It is, now, a Halloween staple in my household, and one that we find new details in with every watch.

With the new 4K release of The Witch, it’s more stunning than it’s ever been. Cinephiles will revel in the sharpness of the picture, which makes the horror feel more lifelike than ever before. There are moments when Black Phillip seems as though he will step out of your screen to offer you butter; the witch herself looks as though she might turn to grab you and spirit you away to her cabin for her dark purposes. If you’ve been hesitating and still don’t own it on Blu-ray, the time is over.

For those who already own The Witch, however, there’s no real reason to upgrade unless you’re just one of those people. The special features—which are great—are no different than they were on the original release from several years ago. It would be nice if some new featurettes or new commentary tracks were added but, aside from the upgraded picture quality, they haven’t given us much to entice us further.

Still, there’s no reason why this film shouldn’t be on the shelves of any lover of horror or cinema. If you’ve made the 4K upgrade and don’t yet own it, you’re out of excuses. Even if you haven’t made the upgrade, it comes packaged with the original Blu-ray so you, too, have no excuse. The Witch remains one of the decade’s most incredible works of horror and one of the greatest horror movies ever made. That alone makes it worth the price to live deliciously.

The Witch is now available to own in a 4K Ultra/Blu-ray combo pack.