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Reviews
The VVitch: A New-England Folktale (2015)
Well-executed, occasionally inspired, but kinda evil
Artworks bear some responsibility for their moral content. When you create narrative art you're creating a fictional world, and your viewers/readers inhabit that world for some period of time. While they're there, they internalize (to some extent) the lessons of that world, just as they do the lessons of the real world.
Therefore if you're going to portray horrible things happening to good people who mean well, there'd better be a good reason for it -- and I mean a good reason *within the logic of the world you're creating*, not some reason extrinsic to the artwork. Otherwise the artwork functions purely exploitatively, portraying evil things just for the entertainment of an audience. More importantly, if you depict an unjust world, one in which virtuous people are not victorious over evil, you contribute however slightly to creating the expectation in your audience that this is how the real world works as well.
I am not convinced that The VVitch's heart is in the right place with respect to these issues.
I call it an "anti-morality play" because its characters, though flawed, are fundamentally innocent, devout, and faithful people, who admit their flaws (or are too young to be aware of them), but despite this are shown no mercy, and are utterly destroyed by literally Satanic forces.
What justifies creating a moral universe in which this can be the case?
Another review suggested that The VVitch is a standard morality play, the moral being that one should not willfully leave the flock of the faithful. It's true that the father confesses to pride, and the banishment of the family from the village at the start of the story might be traced back to this. And the son who is ultimately seduced by the witch is clearly tempted by lust. So this is not an entirely far-fetched interpretation.
It is possible then that this film attempts to depict an extremely severe, perhaps Calvinist, moral universe, in which religion and faith have some place after all. The question then is why--is this being advanced as a true metaphysical perspective? This seems unlikely for at least two reasons: first, the main character, Thomasin, ultimately chooses evil freely despite not exhibiting any obvious character flaw that justifies this (she jokingly portrays herself to her siblings as a witch early in the film, in order to scare them into obedience, but this hardly justifies the outcome of the story). Second, the spoils of evil, though we might imagine them in this universe to be things like eternal damnation, are *portrayed* in the film only as pleasure, even euphoria.
Thus it seems to me that this film creates a universe ruled by evil, in which God is effectively absent but the Devil is real. No mercy is shown, no miracles occur, but dark/evil magic has a real presence, and demons really do live in the woods and slaughter innocent babes.
And this is ultimately why I feel the need to condemn this film, despite its merits. It's not that I think everyone has to buy into a narrowly Christian worldview, but I do think artworks (especially those with mass appeal like films) shape our collective expectations, even if we consciously experience them only as entertainment. And the message that this film undermines is that the Good will ultimately be victorious. That is perhaps a fundamentally Christian view, but it is really at the heart of most world religions, many myths, and very much of traditional popular entertainment. I do not see how a society that abandons that view can have a future.
We live in an age in which religious beliefs are often dismissed in mainstream entertainment as superstitious. Certainly the beliefs of Puritan settlers in the 1600s would seem so, and of course there are elements of that belief system (such as their treatment of women accused of witchery) that deserve scrutiny and criticism. But The VVitch seems to throw out the core tenets of morality more generally. It is not simply amoral (in depicting a "realistic" world devoid of supernatural influences), but anti-moral: it portrays a world in which evil is victorious. To what end?
Also: it's not even scary. Though maybe it would be to a teenager, I don't know.
Iria: Zeiram the Animation (1994)
Fantastic style
This is one of those titles I never watched in the 90s as a kid (when I cut my anime teeth on Robot Carnival, Akira, and eventually, Evangelion), but just decided to give it a spin recently now that everything's free on the internet.
I can now see why it's not heralded as an all-time classic, but I really don't want to dwell on the negative here. What kept me watching (despite a noticeable dip in quality after episode 3, I'd argue) is killer originality and style. This applies mainly to visual, and to some extent audio, design (check out the OP animation, which I find to be pretty strong despite the re-use of some clips in reverse), and also to the world the series creates.
I'm going for a zero-spoilers review here, but to speak generally, there are robot/creature/technology designs in this series that are extremely creative, daring and visually interesting, and that are explored consistently from various angles across the episodes. Despite (justified) complaints about the plot, it too has some interesting elements, including the very unusual transformation of a main character early in the series.
I'm sure had I watched this in the 90s, the nostalgia factor would boost my review by several stars, but with apologies to diehard fans, I do feel 6 is appropriate--but I wanted to celebrate what is in some ways objectively a very unique, compelling and probably (in these respects) underrated anime.