Season of the Witch

Nic Cage is becoming the master of these kinds of movies. I'm not talking supernatural thrillers, I'm talking films that themematically start out a certain way and then flip in to the land of complete crap somewhere along the way. (The recent film "Knowing" springs to mind as an example) As the film progressed, I thought it was interesting, albeit far darker then I was expecting. By the end, the story spins off to freaky land and beyond. A movie you think could be directed towards exploring religious fanaticism or even faith itself instead spins in to a supernatural clusterflub of demons and stupidity. The ending and terrible direction absolutely ruins what was a pretty good first two-thirds of a movie. What makes this twice as bad is the fact that it's a "journey" film, meaning that everything that was set up leads to the resolution. In this case, the resolution is nonsensical and unsatisfying and negates just about anything good about the first two-thirds of its running time.

Season of the Witch is getting ravaged by reviews as I write this. Is it that bad? I don't think so. Is it fantastic then? Well no. This is one of those sword and sandal fantasy films that tread the middle ground, having an interesting premise set up in a fantasy fellowship quest, only for the execution to be hovering around mediocre standards following a rote formula of introducing the problem, gathering the players, and have them encounter sequence after sequence of battle obstacles on the way to their objective.

Nicolas Cage and Ron Perlman play buddies Behman and Felson respectively, knights of the Crusade who make a reputation of being fearsome warriors fighting for a higher cause, only to desert their army and turning their backs from continuing onto Jerusalem after realizing that they are nothing but fighting pawns for the whims of man. Their services get called for by a town inflicted by a plague because of a curse by a girl (Claire Foy) whom they deem a witch, and the agreement forged was for them to escort her to a monastery for a group of monks to decide on the authenticity of the claim, and if so, decide and inflict punishment.

Gathering Priest Debelzag (Stephen Campbell Moore), guide Hegamar (Stephen Graham), one of the remaining fighting fit soldiers of the town with Eckhart (Ulrich Thomsen) and a priest in training Kay (Robert Sheehan) whom the party picked up early in their journey, the group has to band together if they are to get to their destination in one piece, with the accused girl being locked up in a cage but always seem to be drawing undue attention to herself, raising questions about her innocence as we get to see her demonstrate abilities and superhuman strength even, while putting on a saccharine sweet face. Now while all these may point to certain plot loopholes and irrational human behaviour, I'm willing to overlook these flaws since they do get addressed in the final reveal, so all's not totally lost in Bragi F. Schut's story.

Battle sequence design was a little sleepy, and although the introductory big battle scenes involving soldiers of the Crusade were plentiful, it didn't go beyond the usual slash-parry- stab-wash-rinse-repeat cycle coupled with cheesy dialogue exchange between Behman and Felson that try to pass off as comedy. There's an awfully long and painfully executed crossing of a creaky bridge that doesn't seem to want to end, but otherwise passable CG was employed in an attack of wolves, and the money shot in the final battle where all hell breaks loose in the monastery with grotesque looking winged beasts and the expected big boss to fight in an all out melee done arcade style.

Some will probably find the themes here quite objectionable, especially since it sets its sights squarely on how religion gets manipulated by the few, and made suggestive queries what if the Crusade wasn't a calling made by god as claimed by the messengers, but of more negative forces since it involves the killing of innocents. What more, this was played out in quite direct fashion when the final act made that cross-reference in point blank fashion. It's bold in its statement and association, which otherwise the story here lacks any selling points to make an audience sit up and take notice

I'm not sure what Ron Perlman is doing here - the billing on the poster doesn't seem to give him much respect, preferring to marquee Cage alone instead, so while there are inside nods to Hell and the devil and demons here, I'm hoping that we'll get to see another installment of Hellboy instead. Under Dominic Sena's vision, you'd know what to expect when you scan through his resume, being responsible for flicks like Whiteout, Swordfish, and yet another Nicolas Cage starrer in Gone in Sixty Seconds. They're no more than Guilt Trips with potential not lived up to, so don't expect a classic or a masterpiece, but at best entertainment that will struggle to satisfy jaded audiences.

I watch a lot of movies. I've seen a lot of Nick Cage's movies. Some are better than others - but he always seems to deliver "something" in each and every one. He's got this odd, weird - psycho kind of persona that just works in these adventure/fantasy/horror flicks. These kind of films just need the main actor be a tad "off". Trust me, there have been other films were he's been certifiable crazy - and this one pales in comparison in spots - but yet there is still that unmistakable Nick Cage fingerprint.

I love Ron Perlman too. The banter and friendship between him and Cage was enjoyable. I love Perlman in the "Hellboy" series. I loved him in this for all the same reasons. It was like "Hellboy", but without all the makeup.

I've read in other reviews people didn't like the special effects. I loved them - and thought they were excellent. Nothing about them was distracting - only an asset to the movie.

I highly recommend this movie. It's fun, exciting, scary at moments - and well worth a watch.

Season of the witch was a far better film than critics and fellow moviegoers led me to believe. The story is about Cage and Pearlman teaming up to take a witch to a castle where she will be put on trial. Chaos and terror ensue as they treck the mountainside and forest. The film depicts the times very well...and most the accents aren't that bad. But the thing i wasn't expecting was to see Cage actually put some effort into his role. Instead of woodenly walking through the film with terrible hair, Cage shows some true emotion and his hair ain't half bad. Cage is hit or miss, sometimes he's good ("Bad Lieutenant"), sometimes he's bad ("The Knowing"). I think Cage gets an A for effort. It's no his best acting but it's an improvement. Pearlman is great as the sidekick/friend and gets most of the good lines. The special effects are kinda lame and the film drags in certain spots, but overall "Season of the witch" is a decent thriller with some cheesy dialouge. This movie isn't bad as everyone makes it out to be. If you have low expectations like I did, you'll probably get a lot more enjoyment out of it.

Oh, and the priest named De Balzak...pretty hysterical name.

I went into this film with a relatively open mind, knowing I'd never seen a Cage film (shocker) in its entirety and neglecting to look at any reviews, but I was pleasantly surprised. For the most part it's well acted, Perlman played a blinder as Cage's sidekick and Cage himself was quite good too. It was good to see MisFits star Robert Sheehan in a starring role, and the writing wasn't bad either, aside from the odd cheesy line. As far of the story goes, it works, although some of the aspects (such as Cage's motivation for going on the journey in the first place) seem a little far fetched, it's difficult to understand that Perlman's character in particular would go to such lengths for something which only affects Cage, perhaps a more developed background of the two knight's may have helped. The special effects, although in my opinion at times rather unnecessary, are pretty good, and I think the atmosphere of England suffering from the plague was recreated very well, except for the plague suffers seemed to look a little extreme.

I would have scored the film higher, except for that I feel it is very much aimed at quite a small audience, if you don't like the themes this film explores, you won't like it. The film could also have been longer (at 1h34m including a 10m credit sequence) I feel certain things (such as the Cage/Perlman background) could have been developed further to provide a more well-rounded film. Still worth a watch though, not as bad as people are saying.