Witchville

This reminded me a little of "In the Name of the King" (2007). Here instead of Jason Statham though, we have the completely out of his depth Luke Goss as the king "Malachy" and Ed Speleers as his hunky sidekick "Jason" as they try to save the kingdom from the clutches of the evil "Red Queen" (Sarah Douglas). It might have made for a perfectly watchable television movie had the acting been better, but Goss is frankly dreadful as he wields his broadsword with all the menace of a fairy liquid bottle. Speleers is always easy on the eye, but again he makes little impact as their set-piece escapades see them recruit new allies and head for a denouement with the vengeful monarch who breathes red smoke. The budget clearly wasn't huge, but to be fair the special effects folks, they have done a reasonable job at making the film look decent. The story, though, is weak and the writing does little to help overcome the obvious limitations of those delivering it on screen. It might kill ninety minutes on an aircraft somewhere - after a few glasses of something, but otherwise this offers nothing at all new or remarkable.

I have made no secret of disliking Syfy's output in general, but despite its awful title Witchville is actually one of the better ones in my opinion. Granted the title is really quite naff, the story is rather standard and didn't particularly surprise me and while I admired its ambition the dialogue is often quite weak and stilted. However, I liked Witchville. The production values are surprisingly not too bad for a low-budget movie, the sets and costumes look as though they were constructed with care, the scenery is beautiful and the effects are more consistent and less crude, the standout being the hellhound attack which did have me biting my nails. The sword-fighting scenes are efficiently done and nicely choreographed, the direction is competent and I too loved Jozefa's stylish entrances. The music is pretty tolerable too, while the acting while far from award-worthy is decent, especially MyAnna Buring. All in all, despite its weaknesses for me it is one of the better Syfy movies. 7/10 Bethany Cox

I wasn't hoping for much but I got even less than that! This 'movie' was not only bad - devoid of any real plot, wit, or meaningful context; lousy special effects; terrible acting; and laughable direction - it was also a throwback to the most simplistic and misogynist view of magic and witches I have seen in ages. At first I thought they were depicting those views in order to turn them on their head but no- that really was the lens of this movie on the world of magic and female power versus civilization. Even the campy stuff wasn't fun because it seemed not to have any sense of humour about itself and how really really bad it was. If you like to watch things that are really really bad in order to laugh at how bad they are, you might find this a treat of some sort. It really is that bad. Did i mention it is bad?

To begin with, this is a TV movie, therefore you should not have a high expectation about it. However, given that fact, I have seen a low budget action movie which is way better than this one. The actions were very bad; there were some sword fight, but when you look at them, it is exactly the actions that were comparable to a play, not a movie. There were a lot of awkward moment where you can actually see that the actors were waiting for the hit to come slowly..... and then try to deflect them. And of course the details were terrible. The minaret for whatever reason was topped with a cross ? Normally; in this kind of movies, books are made of animal skins, but on this one, it is cheaper to use paper...

All in all, my suggestion is not to waste your time on this one. I've given a 2 vote for the effort of the actors, despite a very bad direction they still do reasonably well....

I shouldn't rate this yet, haven't finished watching it, however, the Kramer character IS cracking me up. Does anyone else think he speaks like an English accented Captain Kirk, William Shatner 60's style?

The pacing and inflection is so funny. I wonder if he realized he was doing that?

hahah

"They............are...........among us.........even now. Pause "One meal..........for one man.............will not.........." and on and on.

I am an avid Sci Fi movie fan...books too....I just wish they had some better writers for the movies ON the Syfy channel. Sheesh. Don't waste your actors.....Luke Goss, Ed Speleers, James Frain (another movie) and more.

I'll watch anything with Luke Goss in it. He is just dang gorgeous.

So far, about a four on the ratings.