I’m afraid I have no way to sugarcoat an opening to a movie such as this. There really are no other ways to lead up to the unconcievable truth. Sure I could have said I haven’t been sure what to expect from Season of the Witch, or that Nicolas Cage is a good actor (despite being in some pretty bad films). But it wouldn’t matter because this one fact remains, no other way to put it:
Season of the Witch fucking sucks.
SYNOPSIS
Season of the Witch follows two Knights (Nicolas Cage, Ron Perlman) on their way home from the Crusades. On their way home they are demanded to return a woman who has been accused of Witchcraft to a local town where she will stand on trial. Yet they must overcome some of the tricks the girl brings.
THE GOOD
Honestly…I can’t think of anything. There are a couple of set and costume designs that feel like they are from the Crusaders time. But that’s it. So now that that’s outta the way…
THE BAD
Look, I’ve already stated that I hated this movie, and even looking back on it now, I can say not only that the film was pointless, but it didn’t need to be made in the first place. It serves no purpose, brings no moral question, no message or reason. It’s just there, and it shouldn’t be.
Where to begin? The visual effects are very poor in this movie, especially near the end where our heroes face off with a Constantine-style monster (how original). It’s a typical Hollywood ending with overblown, terrible CGI that looks like it’s from back in 1998. To think, Avatar came out more than a year ago with mindblowing visual effects, and unfortunately some filmmakers don’t pay attention that with time they could’ve made it better. But then again with the million times this film has been pushed back they could’ve shot a better film. But they didn’t and now we’re here.
The dialogue is atrocious, lines that make “The Phantom Menace” seems like Shakespeare. Even Ron Perlman, who is awesome, has crumby lines and doesn’t really do much as a character. Nicolas Cage. Ok, look I love the guy (no homo). I think he’s a great actor and despite some bad roles, he usually is better than the rest. Here he turns out to be among the worst. In fact all the actors are at their worst, but that could be due to bad writing.
Even the action scenes were dull and went with the “Bourne” style of shooting, the kind where the camera is shaking and you have no idea what the hell is going on. Even they couldn’t get this right.
And riddle me fucking this, Batman: If the girl is a witch, who is set to be murdered somehow, and obviously she doesn’t want to die, than why, in the name of holy fuck does she sit back and do NOTHING in this film. Why didn’t she just kill the men taking her then and there and save the trouble. Sure the movie would’ve ended, but I think I’d be grateful.
And there are certain moments that brings up the Church and how Cage’s character has this inner torment about what God thinks is right and what the Church thinks is right. And they just throw it out there and never resolve it or expand on it. And there are many other examples of something like that in this movie.
There are so many other things I can mention, expand on, nitpick, but in the end it would all lead to the simple fact that this film is just a piece of shit. Terrible dialogue, terrible visuals, terrible story, terrible EVERYTHING. All in all, it’s just an unholy mess of a film and will make my bottom ten list. And I say that with much promise.
I give Season of the Witch a 1/10.