Le streghe son tornate

Witching and Bitching is the latest insane film from Álex de la Iglesia. His last effort was the bonkers violent clown madness that was The Last Circus. This film probably falls a little short of that one overall but it shares the anarchic comedy with violence template pretty closely. Like that film too, this one does lose steam a bit in its final section where it goes for a big ending, which loses sight of what made it good before a little. This is a pretty minor criticism though because on the whole this movie proves again that Iglesia is always someone who delivers something a bit left-field, unconcerned with the niceties of political correctness. The story has thieves on the run from a badly staged crime. On their escape route, they find themselves in a mysterious village in the Basque country where they are soon captured by a coven of witches.

As is common for Iglesia, this one starts out with a great, attention grabbing credit sequence where we are presented with images of witches and evil women throughout the ages. It takes a bit of a nerve to show a picture of notorious female killers such as Myra Hindley juxtaposed with former UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher! After seeing that, well you can't say you haven't been warned. The opening heist is pretty hilarious, with the criminals dressed up as street artists and mascots. It's both funny and successfully pulse-pounding and certainly gets things off to a great start. Once the characters meet the witches, the film moves from being a crime-comedy into a horror-comedy, with a focus always on the humour. The witches themselves make for the most interesting characters in the movie, with Iglesia regular Carolina Bang being the standout as the seriously gorgeous biker-witch – she smolders the screen every time she appears. This section of the film focuses on lots of macabre humour and ends with a horde of witches gathering in a cave in anticipation for the arrival of their queen, who is a giant monstrous being. Like I said earlier, this whole finale in the cavern is less interesting than what has gone before – when things get too big and effects-driven you feel Iglesia himself loses a bit of interest too. But overall, this is another very enjoyable, crazy movie from this Spanish maverick.

This is not Spanish director Alex De La Iglesia's best effort (my personal favorite is Ferpect Crime), but is entertaining and watchable, if you like his brand of anarchic, corrosive, politically incorrect and pitch black humor. Here three misogynistic thieves on the run, trying to flee to France after a botched burglary in Madrid, end up in a little Basque village called Zugarramurdi (a place in which there was a real witch trial in the 17th century) where they are captured by a coven of feminist witches (the leader of which is Almodovar regular Carmen Maura) who subject them to a number of torments. Many more outrageous things happen, but they are not for me to reveal. A couple of very beautiful actresses (Carolina Bang and Macarena Gomez) help the film.

While I did like Angelina Jolie in Maleficent, there is a witch right here, that I'd die for. All puns and jokes aside though: This is a comedy and it does start with a Bang (not Carolina, a literally one) and does not stop from there. It works because it is funny, but in an adult kind of way. No joke or poking fun is too low to go there (and while I'm not a fan of "toilet humor", there is one here, that I think is really good and nicely shot).

It is predictable obviously, but the actors make the whole thing work and you will have "sacrifices" that have to be made (no pun intended), for the inevitable outcome. The effects are really good and while you might argue about characters and their moods, this all get "explained" ... at least in a fashion, that is sufficient enough for a comedy

I thought this movie was great. It starts off very normal with a quite funny movie and slightly zany humour. This then slowly builds into an over the top, hilariously funny romp which also manages to bury a few home truths in amongst the jokes and craziness.

Very surreal its technically a horror movie but more realistically I would say it was comedy with a few horror elements.

I honestly hope more people see this, I think its a shame its not better known and currently not as highly rated as I at least believe it should be. At the very least I think its worth a look if you are intrigued.

That's all that should be said but... I'll say a bit more.

After pulling a jewelry store heist, a group of men find their route of escape leading them to an encounter with witches. It is nothing short of a rollercoaster ride that is hard to lose interest in.

I thought this has some great and pretty funny, moments. Comedy horror isn't really something I usually find much interest in but after watching What We Do In The Shadows, which I love, I wanted to see if I could find any other films that might be just as good. This is a film that kept showing up so I decided to check it out.

Horror comedy is tricky. You can twist things up a bit to add humor but if you go too far, it ends up being a cheese- fest. While this gets close to that fine line, it never went so far that it made me want to walk away from it. That's good so, I feel they got it right with this.

The acting is good, it is filmed and scripted well. Some of the special effects were the only issue I had but once again, it wasn't so bad I wanted to stop watching.

I say watch it if you like horror comedy.