The next film in my collection is #157: The Royal Tenenbaums (2001), directed by Wes Anderson. This probably goes without saying, but uh, there will be spoilers throughout.

There was a specific type of teenager who discovered Wes Anderson in the early 2000s. One who most likely listened to Neutral Milk Hotel, owned at least one piece of jewelry with a mustache on it, and told everyone that the shirt they bought from Urban Outfitters was actually thrifted. But to understand why Wes Anderson films hit so hard with a specific generation of teenagers, we first have to understand the cultural phenomenon that was twee.

The term itself derives from British slang for “sweet” and was a pejorative used to describe something as “excessively quaint.” It emerged in the 1980s as a reaction to the harshness of the post-punk culture, a deliberate softness. Twee pop songs were short and sweet, with simple lyrics about young love and nostalgia. By the time it reached the 2000s, twee had evolved into an entire lifestyle aesthetic — and Wes Anderson was the undisputed patron saint, right next to the Queen, Zooey Deschanel.

Critics turned on Anderson early in his career, saying his work was overly self-indulgent and that it prioritized style over substance. But if one of the core tenets of hipsterdom is not to do what’s popular, doesn’t twee being uncool circle back around to that being the point? I think there is something kind of punk rock about Anderson double-downing on his whimsy despite the backlash. (He basically said, “You think this is twee? How about a stop-motion film about a talking fox in a corduroy suit, BITCH!”)

Marc Spitz, who literally wrote the book on twee, argues that the aesthetic isn’t as shallow as critics may claim. He defined it as ‘the desire for the freedom to be soft in an increasingly hard world,’ a response to the anxiety one may have about modern life. He says to think of the twee figure as a low-fi hero fighting against the commercialization of art, the homogenizing of trends, and the ever-increasing tragedies happening all around us. The movement posed the question: If we can’t make the world better, can we at least have a little whimsy in our personal lives? (The irony, of course, is that the twee aesthetic was eventually absorbed into the very commercialization it was trying to resist…)

But The Royal Tenenbaums isn’t exactly the twee retreat from reality that Spitz mentioned in his book. Despite its beautiful cinematography, whimsical sets, and playful music, the film does not soften its dysfunction. It features real family trauma rooted in parental abandonment — Royal leaves his family, Richie attempts suicide, Margot spirals into multiple affairs, and Chas buckles under his anxiety. Without the twee framing, The Royal Tenenbaums would be a pretty bleak family drama. If anything, this film proves that twee is capable of holding complexity, not just escapism.

In his essay, Tom Hertweck pushes back on critics who dismiss Anderson’s work and argues that his use of twee creates a distance from reality that actually allows these intimate personal stories to exist on their own. Indeed, our reality is not reflected in Wes Anderson’s worlds; our lives are not perfectly symmetrical, nor are they painted in pastels and whimsy. Hertweck argues that Anderson uses his twee sensibilities to frame his subjects more delicately, and that the aesthetic doesn’t so much shield us from this family’s damage as make us pay more attention to it. When we watch one of his films, we can immerse ourselves completely in this new, constructed reality without the burden of our real-life experiences intruding.

While his first two films, Bottle Rocket and Rushmore, both orbit the idea of family, it was with The Royal Tenenbaums that Anderson made the subject explicit. Anderson has said that the film started as a reflection on his own parents’ divorce, but that he moved away from the autobiographical nature once Gene Hackman began shaping Royal’s character. Still, while it may not be based on Anderson’s real life, the emotional texture of the film feels deeply personal, and it remains one of Anderson’s most impactful films due to its timeless quality. After all, a story about a dysfunctional, broken family overcoming their resentments and forgiving each other? That will always be relevant!

Anderson has cited Orson Welles’ The Magnificent Ambersons, a film about a once-great family watching their glory slip away, as a big inspiration for this film. The connection is clear right away as both begin with the opening of a book and a storybook narration. Both films have themes of losing greatness and romanticizing a past that can never be recovered. Part of the joke amongst the Tenenbaum children is that they act like little adults — only, when they grow up to be actual adults, we find that they are still stuck in childhood. Each of them reached the apex of their achievement early, so growing up only meant becoming less exceptional.

The Royal Tenenbaums is framed like a novel, narrated by a deadpan Alec Baldwin, and presented as if adapted from a book with chapter headings. (This kind of narrative technique is called a frame story.) This imaginary book tells the story of Royal Tenenbaum, his wife Etheline, and their three gifted children, all prodigies in their own right — Chas, the business genius; Margo, a gifted playwright; and Richie, the tennis pro. Fast-forward twenty-two years, and our narrator exclaims with magnificent flatness that “virtually all memory of the brilliance of the young Tenenbaums was subsequently erased by two decades of betrayal, failure, and disaster.”

The oldest, Chas, became a financial wizard in his early teens and was described as having an “almost preternatural understanding of international finance.” As an adult, he has since lost his wife in a tragic accident and is now a paranoid, grief-stricken father raising their two sons. After being catastrophically hurt twice in his life — once by his father, who stole money from him as a kid and left, and again by the universe when his wife died — Chas has clearly made it a point never to be caught off guard again. He and his sons, Ari and Uzi, sport matching Adidas tracksuits throughout the film, presumably to be ready for any sudden emergencies.

His relationship with his father is the most openly hostile of the three siblings. (A classic eldest sibling trait.) When Royal moves back into the family home after getting kicked out of the hotel he’s been crashing at, he discovers that his grandchildren don’t even know his name. After seeing how protective Chas is of his boys, Royal takes it upon himself to treat them to an adventure, one that includes shoplifting and a dog fight. Chas is (rightfully) furious. The tension between the two simmers throughout the film, finally breaking open near the end, when their childhood friend, Eli Cash, crashes his car into the side of the Tenenbaums’ house. Royal pulls his grandsons to safety just in time — but not before their dog Buckley is killed by the collision. (Wes Anderson Make a Movie Where The Dog Doesn’t Die Challenge.) Royal can later be seen sweet-talking the firefighters about a dalmatian and later brings the dog to Chas as an apology of sorts. In the moments that follow, we get the crux of the film's emotional arc. Chas takes a deep breath, as if dropping everything he has been carrying for the last twenty years, and says: “I've had a rough year, Dad.” To which Royal replies, “I know you have, Chassie.”

Margot, the Tenenbaums’ adopted daughter, received a Braverman Grant of fifty thousand dollars for a play she wrote in the ninth grade. Now, she is married to a neurologist twice her age, Raleigh St. Clair, presumably a stand-in for her absent father, Royal. (The names sound similar enough.) She hasn’t written a play in years and spends her days watching television while chain-smoking in the bathtub. She is the most guarded of the Tenenbaums, and we see her secrets unspool slowly throughout the film.

We see her self-destructive nature begin when she is buying cigarettes at age 12. It is safe to say her rejection comes from Royal never fully accepting her as his daughter, which he made repeatedly clear as he introduced her to everyone as his “adopted daughter.” On the night of her eleventh birthday, she staged a play with her brothers. We don’t get to see much of the play during the montage flashbacks, only the curtain call where the three are dressed in animal costumes — Richie as a cheetah, Chas as a bear holding a shotgun, and Margot as a zebra with some bullet wounds. When asked his thoughts, Royal dismisses the play, saying ‘it didn’t seem believable’ and that it was ‘a bunch of little kids in animal costumes.’ Margot solemnly stands to leave the room just as Etheline is bringing out her cake, and she continues to walk out as they all sing happy birthday. Perhaps Margot casting herself as the shot-at zebra, the tragic figure, foreshadowed her path to self-destruction. (Also, it just dawned on me that Richie was the cheetah, a natural predator to zebras. Could that reflect his ongoing pursuit of Margot? Knowing Anderson’s attention to detail, everything is intentional!)

In adulthood, Margot has responded to her trauma by essentially becoming unknowable to everyone around her, including herself. Because of her elusiveness, her husband, Raleigh, grows suspicious and hires a private investigator. The report reveals several of her secrets, including her smoking habit, a previous marriage to a Jamaican recording artist, and a string of affairs that includes one with their old neighbor and friend, Eli Cash.

A lot of symbolism can be drawn from Margot’s secret smoking, especially considering there is already a strong connection between cigarettes and sex. Perhaps it is a way for Margot to channel her frustrations about loving Richie, her adopted brother, but being unable to have him. There is a subtle moment when the two are walking in a graveyard and her cigarettes fall out of her pocket. She cannot deny that they aren’t hers, just like she can’t hide her feelings forever. After they finally admit their feelings to each other, Margot attempts to quit smoking, a sign that she is willing to at least try to move past her self-destructive habits.

A little fun fact: In 1988, Philip Morris USA, a Tobacco company, ran a survey asking more than 400,000 smokers about their smoking habits and found that more than half of the respondents regularly lit up after sex. It’s a pretty interesting connection considering there are claims that cigarettes lower one’s sex drive, not to mention that smoking leads to bad teeth and worse health in general. But hey, that’s nothing a little advertising can’t fix! In the 1960s-70s, films started showing gorgeous women pulling out a cigarette after sex, leading people to believe that smoking was something sexy and bold. A famous example would be Anne Bancroft as Mrs. Robinson in The Graduate.

The most notable thing about Margot’s character is, of course, her look. It says a lot that anyone wearing a fur coat with heavy eyeliner and a hair barrette is immediately recognizable as a reference to Margot Tenenbaum. I think a lot of women can relate to Margot and admire how she brings a unique ✨glamour✨ to her depression. This is probably why it remains a popular Halloween costume over two decades later.

All of the Tenenbaum children have incredible costuming, but I have to say that Margot’s really stands the test of time. Costume designer Karen Patch said, “She was dressed in conservative pieces, but she was rebellious in nature — never smiled, heavy makeup, chain-smoked, sexually promiscuous. Her barrettes and pink gloves reflect her inner child who never grew up. Her look stays exactly the same over the decades.” (*Euphoria voice* Margot knew who she was from a very young age.) Her unchanging look from childhood highlights her arrested development.

Eli Cash: You think I’m especially not a genius?
Margot: Well, I just don’t use that word lightly.

Her polo dress and Birkin bag, along with her country club loafers, communicate the prestige and wealth of the once-great Tenenbaum family. Her blunt bob is associated with female rebellion and pairs nicely with her blunt attitude. Her iconic heavy eyeliner embodies teenage angst and signals her melancholic nature. But it is the iconic fur coat that is the quintessential piece to the Margot Tenenbaum look. She somehow managed to make Fendi fur seem punk! It even inspired a few runway shows — Gucci Fall 2015, Lacoste Fall 2015, and Bally Fall 2015 (this one is actually giving more of a Richie-Margot hybrid).

In another scene, Margot wears a sheer slip dress while perched on a bathroom sink in an uncomfortable way no one ever would. This dress represents her alluring sexual side. She is like a siren, bewitching men all around her. It all sort of boils down to the classic daddy issues trope. Sigh… But while seeking the attention she never got from her father, she seems to have picked up on a lot of his bad traits — She walks out on her husband (“You’ve made a cuckhold of me”), and she constantly rejects the love around her just as her father rejected hers. We could even view her promiscuity as another outlet for her inability to be with Richie. When she tells Richie about her affair with Eli, she says: “Anyway, we mostly just talked about you. […] I guess that was just part of the attraction, you know what I mean?”

Oh, and we can’t forget about her wooden finger! At 14, Margot found her biological family in Indiana and lost a finger during a visit while helping her bio-dad chop a piece of wood. The missing finger is a symbol of feeling incomplete. When asked if she tried to sew it back on, she replies: “Wasn’t worth it,” like how it ultimately wasn’t worth it for her to repair her relationship with Royal. She will never fully heal from Royal’s inability to love her in the same way her finger will never grow back.

Margot: You probably don’t even know my middle name.
Royal: That’s a trick question. You don’t have one.
Margot: Helen.

In the end, Margot accepts this painful loss and eventually turns that rejection back on to Royal. (“He’s not your father!” “Neither are you.”)

The preppy polo dress with heavy eyeliner and a fur coat, all topped off with a missing finger and a bad attitude? All of this may not seem to go together, but they all add up perfectly to be one Margot Tenenbaum. It’s Margot’s unknowability that ultimately draws audiences to her, and her mysteriousness foils Richie’s character perfectly. While Richie’s depression is out in the open, hers remains internal. While Richie attempts suicide with a razor, you could say Margot has opted for a slow suicide through decades of smoking instead.

As a young kid, Richie won the U.S. Nationals in tennis three years in a row, winning both the hearts of America and his father. Unlike his siblings, Richie’s athletic career won him favor with his father early on, and he seemingly became Royal’s favorite, causing long-term resentment from his older brother, Chas. But while Richie’s highs were the most public, so were his lows. He suffered a very public nervous breakdown mid-match that was brought on by Margot’s marriage to Raleigh. While Chas responds to his trauma by trying to control everything, and Margo responds to hers by disassociating, Richie chooses to cope by not coping at all. He avoids his problems by going into self-imposed exile, wandering aimlessly around the world by cruise ship.

While on the ship, he writes a letter to Eli, confessing that he has been in love with Margot and that it has quietly defined his entire life. Richie and Margot’s love is certainly a taboo, one that makes many viewers uncomfortable (myself included). But hey, how many movies have you seen with ‘guy is in love with girl his whole life,’ huh? Boring! How about something messy and complicated like ‘guy is in love with his adopted sister’ for once! Anderson presents this dynamic without any judgement, asking us only to believe that their feelings for each other are real, not that we approve of it.

Richie's trauma — from his parents' divorce and his father's criticism to his public failure and the betrayals of everyone he trusted — accumulates into a state where he perceives himself as a burden to those around him. (This feeling is basically Suicide 101.) It's not one betrayal that breaks him; it's a cascade. He learns Margot slept with Eli. He learns Eli is on drugs and lied to him about sleeping with Margot. He learns Chas resents him for his relationship to their father. And he learns his father lied about having cancer as emotional manipulation to move back in when he got kicked out of his hotel. Each revelation strips away another person he thought he could trust.

Richie enters the bathroom to shave his hair and beard, and in that moment decides that there is nothing else to live for. He had been using his unkempt hair and beard, along with his sunglasses, as a shield ever since his embarrassing tennis outburst, a physical manifestation of his withdrawal from the world. But now, staring at his clean-shaven reflection, he has shed his disguise. It is a symbolic unmasking, and for the first time in years, he really takes a look at himself. He says, “I’m going to kill myself tomorrow,” before taking out a razor blade and slashing his wrists.

Chas: Is it dark?
Richie: Of course it’s dark, it’s a suicide note.

In a realistic drama, this scene would be raw and difficult to watch. But with Anderson’s framing — the symmetry, the lighting, the Elliot Smith song — we’re more likely to sit with this moment rather than look away. While many critics dismiss Anderson as superficial, believing he uses beauty and quirkiness to mask pain, this scene is a good example of what Hertweck argues: that Anderson’s use of twee actually allows us to confront the pain more directly.

If you or someone you know is experiencing suicidal thoughts, support is available: National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 988

Richie is found by one of Raleigh’s research subjects, Dudley, and is rushed to the hospital. Once stable, he checks himself out and Margot later finds him in his childhood tent. The two have an emotional talk and finally acknowledge their mutual love for each other, but it is largely left unresolved. “I think we’re just gonna have to be secretly in love with each other and leave it at that, Richie.” It’s a bittersweet ending for these two. But while they can’t be together romantically, they are no longer hiding from each other.

Margot: Did you do it because of me?
Richie: Yeah, but it’s not your fault.

Every character in The Royal Tenenbaums has lost something, and they’re each given sufficient time and energy to weave these storylines together. All three children, once thought to have been geniuses, have lost their former selves. Royal has lost his family. (Granted, due to his own devices.) Etheline has lost a husband and turns to a string of suitors as an attempt to grab hold of any sense of stability. Eli Cash has lost credibility and respect. Raleigh St. Clair has lost his wife, and Dudley has lost his ability to tell time. There are no wasted characters!

For most of the film, Royal is the antagonist, the catalyst for everyone’s pain. (Can’t men do anything right?) But it’s hard for us to stay too angry at him, even when he’s lying about a cancer diagnosis or taking two little kids to a dog fight. Everyone wants redemption — call it the adult fairy tale — and we get to watch Royal realize slowly and painfully what he has lost. After spending decades chasing money and status, Royal finally realizes that what makes him genuinely happy is just being around his family. Even if they can barely tolerate him. Even if he doesn’t deserve it.

Royal: Look, I know I’m going to be the bad guy on this one, but I just want to say the last six days have been the best six days of probably my whole life.
Narrator: Immediately after making this statement, Royal realized that it was true.

In the end, Royal dies of a heart attack — but not before the family has chosen to show up for him in a way they never would have at the beginning of the film. His gravestone, per his own instructions, reads that he died “tragically rescuing his family from the wreckage of a destroyed sinking battleship.” (Going out on one last lie. Love it.) The film doesn’t punish Royal for his lies, but rather we see Royal for who he is — someone flawed, dishonest, and somehow still loved.

Anderson is known for his deliberate use of color, space, and symmetry in every scene of his films, enhancing his storytelling past the standard writing-acting-plot and turning it into true visual art.

In Louis Giannetti’s Understanding Movies, he speaks of the psychological impacts that color can have on an audience, specifically the contrast between warm and cool tones. He says “… cool colors (blue, green, violet) tend to suggest tranquility, aloofness, and serenity” and “warm colors (red, yellow, orange) suggest aggressiveness, violence and stimulation.”

Applying these concepts to The Royal Tenenbaums, we can get a closer look at Anderson’s intentions. In this scene, Margot and Richie are at odds with their estranged father. The aggressively warm color palette implies a level of hostility in the atmosphere that is very fitting of the character’s emotions. Looking at Richie’s bathroom scene, it is an exclusively cool palette, emphasizing his despair and the serenity he feels as he decides to take his own life.

Giannetti also writes about composition: “Since childhood, we have been taught that a drawing must be balanced, with the middle serving as the focal point. […] We expect dominant visual elements to be placed there. Precisely because of this expectation, objects in the center tend to be visually undramatic.”

While many filmmakers may consider placing subjects in the center of the frame childish, Anderson does this often. It likely works because he ensures his characters are interesting enough for the scene to feel anything but boring, with a perfectly symmetrical background — examples here and here. In some shots, the balance is obvious, while others may be unexpected, like in this shot of Raleigh St. Claire below. You’ll notice how there is an equal balance of props on either side of him, and how neither side feels heavier than the other.

As if Anderson’s use of color, symmetry, and dialogue weren’t enough, his use of music in the film also stands out. Some specific moments worth calling out:

• Nico’s “These Days” plays as Margot walks off the bus in slow motion to greet Richie. This is the first time they have seen each other in quite some time, and the song beautifully creates a feeling of melancholic nostalgia. This lyric seems to mirror both of their suffering perfectly: “I’ve been out walking, I don’t do too much talking these days, these days, these days I seem to think a lot about the things that I forgot to do.” As well as this one: “Please, don’t confront me with my failures // I had not forgotten them.”

• “Me and Julio Down By the Schoolyard” by Paul Simon is a joyous song about a bandit breaking the law and plays as Royal takes his grandsons on a wild adventure. These lyrics seem appropriate after Chas finds out and is upset: “When the papa found out, he began to shout // And he started the investigation // It’s against the law, it was against the law.”

• And perhaps the most tragic moment of the film is when “Needle in the Hay” by Elliott Smith plays while Richie is in the bathroom. Smith struggled with heroin addiction and was known to talk often about suicide. With this context and Smith’s naturally mellow sound, this song creates a perfectly heartbreaking backdrop for the scene.

I would be remiss not to address the well-documented tension between Gene Hackman and Wes Anderson during filming. As the story goes, Anderson wrote the role of Royal specifically with Hackman in mind. Hackman, however, had no interest. He later said, “I asked him not to write it for me, because I don't like things that are written for me. I like to invent things, rather than do things with somebody's idea of who they think I am.” (Most people would have accepted that as a no.) And yet, he persisted! Anderson spent months persuading Hackman to sign on — or as Anderson himself puts it, “I wore him down.”

Things did not seem to improve once filming started. On set, Hackman reportedly told Anderson he didn’t understand the film’s tone or style and felt like he was being asked to perform a caricature rather than a real person. Hackman himself has said he prefers hands-off directors who let him explore and invent. (So… basically, the exact opposite of Anderson.) Bill Murray supposedly had to step in to defend Anderson multiple times during filming, to the point where he would show up on set even if he didn’t have a scene that day.

But it wasn’t just about the role — there was also the matter of payment. Wes Anderson is known for paying all his actors equally on the union scale, which is significantly less than most of his star-studded casts might be used to. Most actors accept this pay cut simply because they want to work with him. Hackman, however, found it insulting. To be fair, here was one of our greatest living actors, being asked to work on an experimental indie film for scale pay, in a role he didn't want, directed by a young filmmaker with a very specific vision. I’m not defending Hackman’s attitude, but ya know, I can see how he would be irritated. At the end of the day, Gene Hackman was an actor who thrived on freedom and improvisation, simply making him the worst possible match for a perfectionist like Anderson.

Royal: “I’ve always been considered an asshole for about as long as I can remember. That’s just my style.”
Henry Sherman: “I don’t think you’re an asshole, Royal. I just think you’re kind of a son of a bitch.”
Royal: “Well, I really appreciate that.”

By most accounts, Hackman left the production without saying goodbye — but he did end up coming to the premiere and supposedly liked the film once he saw it. We have to wonder if all of Hackman’s irritation, resistance, and begrudging seeped into his acting, ironically making this the perfect performance of Royal Tenenbaum.

Of course, the rest of the cast also does a brilliant job. Luke Wilson’s portrayal of Richie’s depression, Ben Stiller’s portrayal of Chas’ anxiety, and Gwyneth Paltrow’s portrayal of Margot’s dissociation are all pretty masterful.

Personally, I’ve always found the critique that Anderson’s films are style over substance a little unfair. I think there has always been a clear, emotional core that runs through all of his films — and most notably, in The Royal Tenenbaums. The film tackles a difficult and sad family dynamic: a loving but inattentive mother, a long-gone father, and three grown children with nothing but the memory of their own glory days.

While all of his films have their own merits, The Royal Tenenbaums is the one that really announced Anderson as an artist with a unique point of view. More than just a stylistic novelty, this film proves that he has something to say about family, failure, and forgiveness. The film balances its whimsy with real confrontations of love and anger. Every character gets their moment of vulnerability and every moment is framed with intentionality and perfection.

Like him or not, Wes Anderson remains one of our most original and recognizable directors today, and I think The Royal Tenenbaums defends why he deserves the title!

Thanks for reading, dolls! And if you find any typos, that’s between me and God! 💋

The first film in my collection is #20: Sid and Nancy (1986), directed by Alex Cox. This probably goes without saying, but uh, there will be spoilers throughout.

Before watching this film for the first time last year, I didn’t have much experience with the Sex Pistols. Or much background knowledge of the UK punk scene at all. And yet, I was still aware of the myth that is Sid and Nancy. Even after 40 years, their story remains in the cultural zeitgeist, and they are still one of the most recognizable Halloween couple costumes. In 2021, Kourtney Kardashian and Travis Barker dressed as them, handcuffed together, captioning the photo “till death do us part.” This film has been criticized for inspiring these very costumes rather than capturing real punk authenticity. Sid and Nancy have become shorthand for a doomed romance that transcends punk entirely. They became legends by fulfilling the classic teen archetype: “live fast, die young, leave a good-looking corpse.”

When the film was released in 1986, it was not well received by Sex Pistols fans, nor by the band's remaining members. Johnny Lydon (aka Johnny Rotten, lead vocalist) said this in his book, Rotten: No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs:

“To me, this movie is the lowest form of life. I honestly believe that it celebrates heroin addiction. It definitely glorifies it at the end when that stupid taxi drives off into the sky. That's such nonsense. The squalid New York hotel scenes were fine, except they needed to be even more squalid. All of the scenes in London with the Pistols were nonsense. None bore any sense of reality. […] I don’t think they ever had the intent to research properly in order to make a seriously accurate movie.”

In a later interview, Johnny was asked the question, “Did the movie get anything right?” to which he replied, “Maybe the name ‘Sid.’” lol

I certainly can’t blame Johnny for being upset about the portrayal of his close friend. After all, this was his real life. But it does bring up an interesting question: Who gets to tell one’s story? Is artistic interpretation owed to the people who lived it? Personally, I don’t really buy the argument that a filmmaker has any responsibility to the truth. Besides, I watched some of the footage from the D.O.A.: Rite of Passage documentary, and I’m not sure I’d want to spend two hours watching the real Sid and Nancy anyway…

Luckily, I was able to go into this film with very little baggage. I watched this not as a biopic, but rather a crash-and-burn love affair between two deeply troubled people.

The film was not a box office hit. The late 1980s were supposedly a tough time to release a movie that attempted to capture the punk rock spirit. When the punk movement began, it wasn’t just about the music. It was a direct response to Britain in a crisis. Thatcher’s privatization, deregulation, and cuts to social services at this time led to widespread unemployment and inequality, essentially eroding working-class communities in the UK. What came of it was a generation of folks with nothing to lose. Hence, the punk rock spirit was born! It turns out “Anarchy in the UK” wasn’t just a provocative song title. But while the punk lifestyle encapsulated the socio-economic and political climate of the late 1970s, by the time this film came out, the resistance had already failed. With this context in mind, the film reads not only as a tragic love story between two punks but also as an elegy for a movement that burned bright and got swallowed up by the system. Just like Sid.

As I talk about the film from here on out, I want to make it clear that any mention of these characters is specifically referring to their portrayal in the movie, not the real people.

The film opens on October 12, 1978, when police find Nancy Spungen dead in the Chelsea Hotel. Her boyfriend, former Sex Pistols bassist Sid Vicious, is taken into custody and told to describe what happened. We are transported through a flashback to the previous year, when the Sex Pistols were at the height of their fame. This is the fun part. The (no) sex, drugs, and rock n’ roll part. It’s a brash, rowdy black comedy that showcases the punk scene in all its bad taste glory.

Sid and Johnny meet Nancy, an American groupie who had come to London to follow these hot new punk bands. She is dismissed by the band at first, as her intentions are quite obvious.

Johnny: Fuckin’ Americans. That’s all you ever think about: sex. None of us fucks, see? Sex is ugly. None of your free hippie love shit here.

“Sex is boring,” as Sid tells her that night, but they begin dating soon after when he feels sorry for her after watching her get rejected by some other punk. It is implied that Nancy introduces Sid to heroin soon after, and they swiftly fall into a self-destructive, drug-fueled relationship that frays Sid’s relationship with the rest of the band.

There is a great sequence during the Sex Pistols’ disastrous Silver Jubilee celebration where the two are walking together as the people around them are running from the police. It’s one long tracking shot backwards as they make their way through the mayhem like ghosts. It’s really quite beautiful, and gives us a sense that these two really do belong together. Just them against the world, moving through chaos.

When the band sets off on a month-long American tour, it is notably disastrous. Now fully addicted to heroin, Sid is strung out of his mind and starts getting physically violent during their shows. While everyone attempts to help and warn Sid about his relationship with Nancy, he stubbornly ignores them. In the midst of their tour, the band breaks up.

Now in America, and now without a band, the tone becomes progressively more bleak and claustrophobic.

Sid reunites with Nancy in New York City, and she convinces him that he could have a solo career. Unfortunately, this attempt is fruitless as Sid is now considered a washed-up has-been. They end up settling in the Chelsea Hotel, where they live in squalor and descend deeper into their heroin addiction. One of the most notable shots in the entire film is when they kiss against a dumpster in an alley while garbage slowly falls all around them. It’s a pretty obvious metaphor for their relationship — passionate and doomed. These two are divorced from the world, still loving each other as everything comes crashing down.

The film ends tragically one night during an argument when Nancy attacks Sid and begs him to kill her. They start fighting in a drug-induced haze and Sid stabs her. (Whether it was intentional is up to interpretation.) The two fall asleep and later Nancy stumbles into the bathroom where she collapses and dies.

Now caught up to the events of the opening scene, Sid is bailed out temporarily by his mother (who is also a heroin addict) and we watch as he wanders into a restaurant and then disco-dances joyfully to KC and the Sunshine Band with a bunch of kids. This highlights how Sid really was just a young kid, vulnerable and insecure. This sentimental ending should probably feel like a relief, and yet, it reads more devastating considering we know what happens next. (Hint: he overdoses.)

The final shot of the film is a taxi picking Sid up, where he finds an alive Nancy in the backseat. The two embrace as the cab seemingly drives off to…the afterlife? One of the biggest criticisms of the film, aside from the inaccuracies, is that this film glorifies Sid’s self-destruction. I suppose this scene is what they mean…

When Alex Cox was asked what he would do differently if he remade the film in 2016, he stated that he wouldn’t have done the sentimental, happy ending. There is a scene where Sid and Nancy go to the methadone clinic and they are refused methadone until they admit that they have betrayed the punk movement and themselves. Cox said that this was his point of the film and that the quasi-happy ending undercuts that.

“The punk movement was essentially a positive moment that was supposed to be forward-looking. You can’t do that if you’re a junkie rock star in a hotel room. […] If I was to remake it, I would end it with Sid dying in a pool of his own vomit.”

As for the criticisms saying the film glorified drug use in general, I have to ask… did you see the movie?? There was nothing about Sid and Nancy’s self-destruction that appeared to be fun. There were no fun-time drug partying scenes. When Sid tries heroin for the first time, we immediately see him hugging the toilet afterwards. That doesn’t necessarily make you want to run out and give it a go... But this leads to another interesting question: Does making a film about something automatically mean it’s glorifying it? In my opinion, the film never makes Sid out to be a hero. In fact, they are both pretty unlikable throughout the entire film. That’s not to say we don’t feel sympathy for them, but it’s more in the broader sense. Mostly, you just feel sad that it is even possible for someone to make themselves this unhappy.

Despite this being his breakthrough big-screen performance, Gary Oldman has been pretty vocal about how he was not initially interested in the role, even saying that he turned it down twice. In the audio commentary, he stated, “I had no interest in the Sex Pistols. I looked at it and thought, ‘Why? Why would you make a movie about these people?” But I don’t believe the film asks us to like these characters, and it does not shy away from showing that they are very flawed, volatile people. Reminder: you don’t have to like a character (or the subject matter) for a movie to be good!

While I believe this film works well as a warning against drug abuse, I also found that it emphasized the greedy capitalist nature of the music industry. There is quite a bit of irony in record labels capitalizing on punk during this time. Bands who were once at the forefront of this anti-establishment movement were now finding themselves caught between their own punk-rock ideals and the glittering promises of the industry. When The Clash signed a major label with CBS Records in 1977 for £100,000, it was seen as a massive betrayal of everything punk stood for.

Cut to a 17-year-old Sid Vicious, the poster child for this kind of industry exploitation. He was a kid with no prospects, handed an insane amount of fame, and essentially told that his value was in staying dangerous and fucked up all the time. When you’re otherwise unemployable, this seems like a pretty damn good gig.

The film essentially has two acts, and there’s a pretty clear line dividing them: there’s the British half and the American half. Through Roger Deakins’ cinematography, we can map the film’s emotion as we transition from one to the other. When in Britain, the scenes are bright and colorful, reflecting the spirit of the punk rock movement — vibrant and alive. As the two make their way to America, and they start to descend further into addiction, the scenes become much more monochrome and shadowy.

Even amongst critics of the film, Gary Oldman and Chloe Webb have still been praised for their performance and commitment to the roles. Chloe does a great job portraying Nancy, who was often described as being miserable and annoying, with humanity and compassion. (I won’t comment on my suspected misogyny on this front, but… just know I have it.) In one of the most emotion-heavy scenes of the film, the couple is in a telephone booth trying to get money from Nancy’s parents. They refuse, which sends Nancy into an emotional spiral. (“They said we’d spend it on drugs!” “Well, we would!”) Webb commits so hard in this scene that she actually breaks the real glass in the photobooth, not just the sugarglass pane made for the scene. With a similar level of commitment, Oldman reportedly undertook such a drastic diet to achieve Sid’s emaciated physique — a diet solely of steamed fish and melon — that he was diagnosed with malnutrition at one point!

There is a great scene where Oldman recreates Sid’s performance of Frank Sinatra’s “My Way.” The original was filmed for The Great Rock ‘n’ Roll Swindle, a mockumentary about the Sex Pistols filmed shortly before he died in 1979. In the context of the film, this scene is presented more as a fantasy rather than a performance. It suggests that underneath all of this punk nihilism, Sid really was just a kid who wanted to be adored, and that the line between rebellion and performance is thinner than a lot of punks want to admit.

Overall, this film worked for me, and I ended up liking it more this second time around. My only critique is that I would have liked to have seen more exploration of why these two were so drawn to each other in the first place. It seemed very sudden that we jumped from “sex is boring” to a murder-suicide pact. Although thinking on it further, that may have been a deliberate choice, considering there probably wasn’t much rationality to their relationship to begin with.

As for its place in the collection, Criterion likes to select films that defined a moment. The punk movement was a genuinely significant moment in the UK, and this is one of the few serious cinematic attempts to capture it. (That I know of.) That’s not to say the film is a perfect representation of the time (just ask any Sex Pistols fan), but I can’t really think of a more perfect way to capture the punk spirit than one that is imperfect. To make a polished film about the punk experience would appear nothing more than a lie, if you think about it.

Whether it is based on complete truth or not, Sid and Nancy is essentially a portrait of the inner turmoil of a destructive relationship. These two are so fucked up, so hopeless, that they could only really love each other. In a way, they really are meant for each other — but even in their own fantasies, the two were doomed. This film shows the tragic love triangle between two troubled people and the heroin that destroyed them both.

Nancy: When I’m dead, will you be sad?
Sid: I couldn’t live without you.
Nancy: You couldn’t?
Sid: No.
Nancy: We better go together then.

These two were sort of a fucked up, punk-rock Romeo and Juliet — and what's more timeless than doomed love?

My Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Thanks for reading, dolls! And if you find any typos, they were a creative choice. 💋

All of this valid criticism aside, for some people, Emerald’s brand of provocative, visually stunning filmmaking still works for them. I guess I am one of those people. 😬 Maybe that’s my own cognitive dissonance that I’m willing to sit with…

I liked this reimagining of Wuthering Heights — sue me! — and not that I have to prove anything to anyone, but I have read the book, and I even studied English literature in college. I feel as though I can both critique Fennell’s choices and still recognize that she has an eye for visual storytelling. Everyone is entitled to their opinions, of course, but I find a lot of the online discourse around this movie to be untethered to reality — that the film is the death of art, that Emily Brontë is rolling in her grave, that the Brontë estate needs to sue, that Fennell is a “figurehead to the literacy crisis” …I am begging y’all to get a grip. By liking a movie, I am somehow admitting to being illiterate, or like, contributing to the downfall of society? Damn, can’t a girl just catch a vibe!

Full disclosure, I have never really felt strongly about the book, so personally, the changes the movie made didn’t bother me. In fact, I liked a lot of them. For example, I prefer watching Isabella be a consensual little freak rather than watch her be abused. Get it, girl!

For those disappointed by Wuthering Heights, I’m genuinely struggling to understand what faithful adaptation they were expecting. Not to sound like an Emerald ass-kisser, but between the trailer, the whimsical costuming, and the Charli XCX soundtrack, it seemed pretty clear that she was taking some (a lot of) creative liberties. I mean, she even put the title in quotation marks. Emerald said herself that she made the film based on how she felt reading the book at 14, which explains the film’s immature, emotionally maximalist understanding of the source material. And on some level, I think it is a really interesting artistic choice to lean into the adolescent fever dream of one’s first encounter with a work rather than a scholarly interpretation. Sure, it’s reductive, but I wouldn’t exactly call it a crime against literature…

The way I see it, Emerald Fennell’s movie and Emily Brontë’s novel are two separate works. And while one has influenced the other, I don’t believe an adaptation has any obligation to be true to its source material. I bet Mary Shelley wouldn't be thrilled that her novel about society’s rejection of the ‘other’ has been adapted into a bajillion movies where her deeply sympathetic creature becomes a grunting green monster with bolts in his neck. And if Emily Brontë is rolling in her grave right now, then I know Shakespeare’s ass is dizzy as hell down there! How many reimaginings has his work had? The limit does not exist… Filmmakers have been taking creative liberties since the medium was invented, and the beloved books we all love have survived just fine.

Roland Barthes’ “Death of the Author” theory states that once you release your work into the world, it no longer belongs to you — a book belongs to its readers, not its author. Artists are free to take inspiration from a work however they choose. That’s kind of the whole beauty of it, in my opinion. I don’t think we should start policing who can have a ‘correct’ interpretation, especially when talking about a work that is over 200 years old. (Oh, you know Emily personally, do you?) This fantastical adaptation of Wuthering Heights takes absolutely nothing away from the original work. If I really wanted to, I could argue that if you’re expecting a movie to be a substitute for engaging with a book’s themes, or that a 120-minute blockbuster could hold up against a complex novel, then perhaps the literacy crisis call is coming from inside the house… But that’s a whole other conversation. 👀

I’m not saying everyone should like the movie — you can even hate it if you want! — but if the only criticism is that it isn’t faithful to the book, well, that’s pretty boring. An adaptation involves change. It’s quite literally what the word means. Ultimately, it is a lot easier (and more fair) to judge works as they are rather than what they could have been, or what we believe they should have been. Whether Fennell’s aesthetic-forward version works for you is a matter of taste, not necessarily intelligence. And the discourse would be a hell of a lot more interesting if we could discuss her choices critically without suggesting that everyone who enjoyed the film is personally responsible for the collapse of literacy in Western civilization.

Emerald’s Wuthering Heights is not a beat-for-beat adaptation, but I do believe it captures the overall essence of the story. It’s Gothic, it’s romantic (yes, romance can be toxic), and it shows two people who are deeply in love but are ultimately destructive to each other and everyone around them. Sometimes, love is not enough to overcome deep hurt. Despite it all, I took the movie at face value and I really enjoyed it. If it helps, maybe think of it as Wuthering Heights fanfiction. Life can be beautiful if you don’t go in with the intention of hating something. 💕

Thanks for reading, dolls! And if you find any typos, they were a creative decision. 💋

So, my next film is one of my favorite horror movies, The Witch (2015), directed by Robert Eggers. This probably goes without saying, but uh, there will be spoilers throughout.

When I first watched The Witch ten years ago, I wasn’t much of a horror movie fan. I wasn’t necessarily against them, and I would definitely watch them with others, but I hadn’t quite developed an appreciation for the genre. On first watch, I imagine I was too busy trying to figure out what the hell was going on to really pick up on all of the film’s intricate themes. All I remember was that once Black Phillip started talking in a sexy, deep voice and Thomasin ran into the woods naked to live her witchy fantasy, I was sold. Since then, I’ve watched The Witch probably five or six times (definitely twice in the last six months lol), and it still holds up as one of my favorites.

At the time, A24 supposedly had a tough time marketing the film before its release. To be fair, “satanic feminist art film” isn’t exactly a four-quadrant crowd-pleaser. I’m not sure if Eggers intended to make such a feminist work, but hey, when you tell a story about Puritan patriarchy and a young woman caught in the thick of it, you’re automatically entering the territory. I don’t make the rules! I suspect most audiences went in expecting a conventional spooky ride in the woods (I Went To The Movies and All I Got Was A Theological Slow-Burn Folk Nightmare), but The Witch actually offers something much more bleak and devastating.

The film begins with English settler William being exiled from a 1630s Puritan settlement over his “prideful deceit.” There were essentially two types of Puritans at the time — those who wanted to purify the Church of England, and separatists who wanted to separate from the church completely. We can assume that William is the latter and happened to be living amongst the former, hence the disagreement leading to his voluntary banishment. Along with his pregnant wife, Katherine, teenage daughter, Thomasin, preteen son, Caleb, and young twins, Mercy and Jonas, they pack up and leave.

Right off the bat, the film makes it clear that Thomasin is no ordinary Puritan girl, passive and obedient. When the courts banish her father, the rest of the family follows while she hesitates. Then, as the family rides off, Thomasin continues to stare toward the community she is leaving behind while the rest of her family looks away, stressing that they will fall in line with the patriarch. The gates of the village swing shut as their wagon rides off, indicating that this avenue has now been closed to her. She is, essentially, alone.

William’s extreme version of Christianity is built on the notion that suffering is evidence that your faith is working. And well, if that’s the case… I guess it’s working out pretty well for them. Deprivation, hunger, isolation, hard labor — these are all supposedly tests of their faithfulness to God. Essentially, this patriarch would rather choose starvation for his entire family than compromise on his convictions. At what point is sticking to your guns no longer admirable? I think when you lead your family to their horrific deaths, but… that’s just me. When the only thing that matters is devotion, that leaves little room for happiness and pleasure. The entire family is put to work to build their new homestead!

There is a great scene of Thomasin praying, where we catch a glimpse of her growing resistance. Thomasin wishes she could be better, more devout, but she is suppressing what she really desires. We already see her yearning for an escape, even if she isn’t fully aware of it herself.

“I here confess I’ve lived in sin. And broken every one of thy commandments in thought. Followed the desires of mine own will and not the Holy Spirit. I know I deserve more shame and misery in this life and everlasting hellfire.”

Some have read this as the moment the Devil marks Thomasin as a target. I suppose if you view this film as the contrast of “good” and “evil,” that might make sense. But to me, this is simply a moment where a young woman is struggling between wanting something else for her life and doing what is expected of her. A lot of women can relate, even today. It is worth pointing out that at this point, she hasn’t actually done anything wrong — in fact, she actually never does anything wrong the entire film. (Until she… with the billhook… we’ll get to it.) At this point, all of Thomasin’s sins are only “in thought.” However, during this time, even wanting something else for your life is enough to condemn you.

Katherine shortly bears their fifth child, Samuel, and while under Thomasin’s care, the baby abruptly disappears during a riveting game of peek-a-boo. Thomasin desperately looks to the surrounding forest, but sees nothing. But the film doesn’t leave us guessing where the baby went for very long, though. We immediately cut to poor Samuel with an old witch, where it is revealed in a rather gruesome way that she is using the unbaptized baby to make a… well, there’s no other way to say it. To make a human baby paste for her flying ointment. This is all within the first ten minutes, by the way. Starting strong with a baby-killing!

Believing that it could have been a wolf that snatched Samuel, William takes Caleb into the woods to catch it. William admits to having sold Katherine’s silver cup to buy the hunting supplies, further indicating that things aren’t really looking too good for them. While on this hunt, Caleb clearly has a lot of anxiety about the concept of original sin. The Puritans believed strongly in predestination, and since Samuel had not yet been baptized, unfortunately, he has likely gone to hell. Bummer :/ This scene with Caleb and his father really touches on how traumatic these ideas can be for children. Even as young as Caleb is, he can see the contradiction and unfairness in an innocent baby going to hell. His father offers little reassurance.

Caleb: Was Samuel born a sinner? How might then...
William: We pray he hath entered God’s Kingdom.
Caleb: What wickedness hath he done?
William: Place faith in God, Caleb. We’ll speak no more on thy brother.
Caleb: Is he in hell?
William: Caleb!
Caleb: Mother will not stop her prayer...And if he died? If I died this day?
William: What is this?
Caleb: I hold evil in my heart. My sins are not pardoned.

At the same time, Caleb is struggling to suppress his own natural desires and worries that he may be going to hell as well. Another unfortunate symptom of the family’s isolation is that Caleb’s maturing sexual desire has no place to land other than his older sister. Big yikes… This is causing him great stress. I mean, imagine being a teenager and genuinely scared that you will spend eternity in a burning hell because your normal development is considered evil. (Tfw your hormones accidentally summon the devil.)

Still convinced that it was a wolf that took Samuel, Thomasin and Caleb later sneak into the forest to check the trap. Caleb is separated from his sister and stumbles into the clutches of the witch, who is now disguised as a seductive young woman. She tempts Caleb with her alluring sexuality, and he walks toward her — both with fear and temptation. The Victoria’s Secret model witch kisses him and an elderly arm reaches up and grabs him by the head before cutting to the next scene.

Then, in one of the most disturbing and pivotal scenes of the film, Caleb returns to the farm a few days later, naked and delirious. Katherine suspects witchcraft and begins to pray over him. The twins (who are incredibly annoying) accuse Thomasin, which she passionately denies. William starts to grill his daughter, but while praying over Caleb, the twins allegedly forget how to pray and blame Thomasin once again, sending the family into full-blown hysterics. Caleb begins violently convulsing with his mouth clenched shut and his throat bobbing. William manages to pry his mouth open and dislodge an entire apple from his throat. It is rotten with a single bite taken out of it, an obvious symbol for original sin.

Caleb stops convulsing, and with arms outstretched, he slowly sits up and proclaims his devotion to Christ before dying peacefully. It’s difficult to say whether Caleb is truly saved or not, as his joyous prayer could be read either as salvation or as the witch’s mockery.

“Wholly thine I am, my sweet Lord Jesus. My Lord, my love, kiss me with the kisses of thy mouth! How lovely art thou! Thy embrace! My Lord! My Lord! My love! My sole salvation! Take me to thy lap!”

While losing baby Samel had been chalked up to a wolf or some other animal, Caleb’s death signals a huge shift in the film. By facing this witchcraft dead-on, the final act of the film is officially set in motion.

The family’s world is crumbling, and their anxieties need to land somewhere. Luckily for them, they have a teenage daughter! Thomasin suffers from the dreaded “having boobs” syndrome, so naturally, she becomes the family’s punching bag for their father’s pig-headed choices. (If men are such natural-born leaders, why are they so bad at it?) Since the dawn of time, there has been no better scapegoat than a young woman! After Caleb’s death, the family is all too ready to accept Thomasin as the problem.

Out of frustration, William locks Thomasin and the twins in the goat house as a punishment for arguing. Thomasin wakes in the middle of the night to find the witch drinking blood from one of the goats' teats, then watches as she seemingly attacks the twins off-screen. At the same time, there is an extremely haunting scene where Katherine is in a dream, and we see Caleb peacefully holding baby Samuel. (You’ll also notice that the silver cup that William admitted to selling is also in the background.) She attempts to nurse the baby in her dream-like state, but it is later revealed to be a crow pecking at her bloodied chest.

William wakes the next morning and we catch a glimpse of Katherine with blood on her tunic, indicating that the crow was not part of the dream. Yeesh. He steps outside to find the goats slaughtered, the twins missing, and an unconscious Thomasin with blood on her hands. (She is not beating the witch allegations, I fear…)

Before Thomasin can even get up, Black Phillip gores William and kills him, leading an unhinged Katherine to lash out at Thomasin. She attempts to strangle Thomasin, suggesting that she is a “proud slut,” tempting both her brother and her father with her maturing womanhood. Under this particular brand of patriarchy, women are seen as a symbol of “sin” and temptation. They are the ones to blame, not the men experiencing these temptations themselves. (Ugh.) In an act of self-defense, Thomasin tearfully kills her mother with a billhook. It is a very emotionally tense scene as we watch Thomasin embrace her mother’s bloody body.

Thomasin stands and stares out toward Caleb’s grave, and it hits her that she is now completely alone. She slowly removes her bodice, as if she is finally stripping herself of her Puritan past. There is nothing left for her here. Later, Black Phillip leads her into the goat stable, where she begs the goat to speak — and in the most eerily smooth and spooky voice, he does. Black Phillip (who is Satan, in case you didn’t catch that) offers Thomasin the life she desires, a life the world has refused her. A life of warmth, comfort, and autonomy.

“Wouldst thou like the taste of butter? A pretty dress? Wouldst thou like to live deliciously?”

Given all that she’s been through, can you blame the girl for taking the goat up on his offer?? A shadowy figure emerges behind her, and she is guided to sign her name in a book. Black Phillip then accompanies her to the forest, where she finds a coven of naked witches holding a Witches’ Sabbath around a bonfire. The witches begin to levitate and Thomasin joins them, laughing hysterically as she ascends above the trees.

I appreciate the film’s ambiguous ending, as it trusts the audience to determine whether this is a happy ending for Thomasin or not. On one hand, she gets the freedom she desired. She is now allowed to express herself with fewer limitations. But at what cost? She did have to sign her soul to the Devil and become a witch who preys on innocent babies…

A little fun fact: Modern Satanism is actually quite an interesting rabbit hole for anyone interested. Some may be surprised to learn that the Satanist community does not actually endorse evil or promote child sacrifices. Satan is used more as a symbol of rebellion, self-determination, and refusing religious ideology. If you think about it, anyone who sees God as responsible for everything good and Satan as responsible for everything bad is operating off a version of Christianity that is detached from its historical origins completely. In fact, the Bible states quite explicitly that God is responsible for both good and evil. Satanists are just pointing out the contradiction. (Look, you’re not going to find me at the Church of Satan on Sundays any time soon, but I mean, they’ve got a point…)

Here’s how I choose to interpret the film’s ending: At the end of the day, Thomasin was offered a choice, the first choice she had likely ever been offered, and she took her chances. To me, the ending felt like a sweet release, and the final shot of Thomasin laughing pretty much says it all. In my opinion, the coven represents female solidarity outside the patriarchal structures in which she had been confined.

There is, of course, an argument to be made that the Devil is simply another patriarchal figure, and that Thomasin just ends up trading one master for another. This is an interesting interpretation, but ultimately, she is left with no place to go and essentially caught between two evils: signing her soul away to the Devil or continuing to face a life of hard work and oppression in Puritan life. At least one of those doesn’t require washing your father’s goat shit-stained tunics.

This is a film that definitely benefits from a second viewing (or a third, or fourth…) in order to really grasp the film’s more radical messages. One of the biggest takeaways was that, in its extreme form, Christianity can be the real evil, as it robs people (especially women) of a natural, healthy way of being. The events of this film may be an extreme example of it, but the toxic ideology comes through loud and clear.

Fun little history lesson: Malleus Maleficarum, basically the 15th-century Witch Hunt for Dummies, helped formalize the cultural habit of blaming women for everything. It suggested that women were more susceptible to evil than men, and therefore, should always be suspect number one in any unsavory event. The Catholic Church actually disavowed the text in 1490, just three years after it was published, but the damage had already been done. The fear of the female witch had embedded itself into the social consciousness anyway.

Not to shock you, but misogyny is pretty much built into the infrastructure of all these witch myths since humans could speak. Historically, the witch figure has represented women who have refused the social order, both in terms of patriarchal ownership and actualizing their sexual desires. Once you start researching witchcraft throughout the ages, you’ll find a lot about how “Satanism” has traditionally been connected to female sexuality. Hm…

From Circe and Medea to midwives burned at the stake, the witch has always been a convenient archetype for male anxieties about female autonomy. When women step outside the roles assigned to them, mythology has a long tradition of turning them into monsters. In fact, scholars often connect witch imagery, or the “monstrous feminine,” with being a crucial patriarchal construct. Basically meaning that women become monsters because patriarchy needs them to be. (Men? Being accountable for their own thoughts and actions? Don’t be ridiculous! Women are right there.)

The dramatic irony threaded throughout the entire film is that we know Thomasin is not to blame for the family’s misfortunes. The horror comes from the anxiety of watching her get blamed for it anyway. Suspicion slowly turns into vengeful wrath as the family begins to break. Much like Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, mass hysteria effectively turns innocents against each other, distracting them from the greater threats. (This double feature would go crazy, by the way!)

One criticism of the film is that by making the Devil and witchcraft true, the film is suggesting that perhaps some women condemned in the Salem Witch Trials were actually witches. Personally, I don’t think this makes much of an impact. Real or not, Thomasin is condemned whether she was a witch or not. If things had gone a different way, perhaps she would have been tortured and killed just like the other women who were unfairly accused. While the film seemingly condemns this kind of Puritan thinking, it also hints that it can actually drive people to the dark side. If you paint someone out to be the villain, sometimes it’s easier for them to just become one…

Among the barren New England landscapes with withering trees and wooden shacks, Robert Eggers, along with cinematographer Jarin Blaschke, paints a very bleak picture of a family’s downfall through folk mythology. (Lowkey, this movie did to New England forests what Jaws did for the ocean.) It draws you slowly into its world, building dread so methodically that by the time Thomasin signs her name in the Devil’s book, you feel almost relieved. At least it’s over.

It’s impossible not to notice Eggers’ dedication to historical authenticity. Allegedly, there were no electric or artificial light sources; only the sun, moon, and period-accurate candlelight. The flat, grey darkness of the film makes every scene feel dim and claustrophobic. Eggers also claims that much of the script was directly picked up from written accounts of witchcraft from the period, including journals and court records. When asked if he will continue to make films in this genre, he said: “The past is the genre I am most enamored with… if that’s a genre.”

Then there is Mark Korven’s score, which hits all the right notes (pun intended). The brief he was given from Eggers was supposedly this: no drums, no woodwinds, no brass, and “maximum dissonance at all times.”

The backbone of the score is a unique instrument called a nyckelharpa, a medieval Swedish keyed violin, but the most notable element is the choir. The vocals were performed by The Element Choir in Toronto, who supposedly specialize in improvisation. Allegedly, Korven gave them absolutely no notes to work from, only loose verbal directions like, “sing one note for ten seconds” or “everyone start whooping.” The chaotic crescendos and high-pitched harmonies add to the spookiness and give us the sense that the monster in this movie is ethereal.

There are some incredible performances carried throughout the entire film — Ralph Ineson and his perfectly gravely voice, and Kate Dickie, who brings such an emotional performance to her character’s unraveling. But Anya Taylor-Joy is the real standout. In her first on-screen performance, she was able to straddle sin and virtue with subtlety. There is one scene in particular that stands out when she begins speaking to Black Phillip. ATJ uses the most subtle facial movements to convey the contradicting emotions of grief and excitement as she agrees to “live deliciously.” It’s very impressive!

It’s also impressive how they managed to find child actors like this. I’d be remiss to not mention Harvey’s performance during Caleb’s death scene. It is an important moment, as the entire last act essentially hinges on it, and with the convulsions, ecstatic prayer, and the ambiguous final moment of peace, he did a pretty incredible job for a young kid! (Speaking of kids, I love these bloopers where Eggers attempts to direct the young kids. “I need you to behave or you won’t be able to blow out the candles.” lol)

There have been countless depictions of 17th-century Colonial America, and the era’s religious superstitions make it a great backdrop for horror films. The Witch offers a fresh spin on the witch subgenre. It exposes how, when pushed far enough, one can become the very thing they fear. Or how treating suffering as a virtue and autonomy as a sin is not, in fact, the way to go. (Shocker!) It may not have the gore and jump scares one may come to expect from horror movies, but it does hit on something truly terrifying: the psychological stress of a world where every natural desire can become evidence against you, even amongst your own family.

Despite Eggers’ self-criticisms — the firewood looking too uniform, the goats being the wrong breed, the candles being all wrong, Anya’s earring holes not being CGI’d out — none of it registers as a viewer. He clearly holds himself to a standard that most of us would consider unreachable because personally, I find this movie to be damn-near perfect. After this, Eggers went on to prove himself as a master of dark and disturbing vibes — The Lighthouse, The Northman, Nosferatu, and the upcoming Werwulf. (I am SAT!) But knowing that The Witch was his starting point, and watching it again with that context, it is pretty crazy. Some people really are just born with it.

My Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Thanks for reading, dolls! And if you find any typos, they were a creative choice. 💋

Babygirl (2024)
in theaters

There are so few movies that I would be willing to watch two days in a row. And Babygirl was not one of them. Look, no one is more “yes, mother!” toward Nicole Kidman than me. I adore her. She can step on my neck and I’d say thank you. I appreciate the meme-ability of this movie and I love a woman desperate to get some. But this movie just didn’t do it for me. I was waiting for it to…go there. And instead, it stayed here. I was waiting for it to get super kinky, or for Samual to blackmail Romy and destroy her life, or in the end, have it turn out Samual never existed. (“But Mrs. Mathis, we haven’t had interns at Tech Company in over twenty years…”) (Besides, what company allows interns to start the week before Christmas anyway?) No, instead we get Nicole moaning on the floor and masturbating to a Brooks Brothers necktie. She has an affair with an intern and ultimately, she faces zero consequences for it. I would have at least liked a little more cat-and-mouse between Romy and Samual before they inevitably hook up in a musty hotel. I will say that Nicole looked amazing, Harris was hot (my favorite scene was him straight vibing to Father Figure by George Michael) and the rhythmic growling, heavy-breathing soundtrack by Cristobal Tapia De Veer was incredible.

Which brings me to my next watch…

Secretary (2002)
rewatch, on Amazon Prime

If you left Babygirl wanting more (like I did), I recommend watching Secretary. In the opening scene, we see her in a collar, with her hands locked into cuffs on a horizontal pole while she completes her secretary duties with ease. It’s a shocking introduction to our main character, Lee, but it’s less about the fetish gear and more about how serene and confident she looks in it. Despite being locked up, this is a woman in control.

Dragula, Seasons 5 + 6
on Shudder / AMC+

I signed up for a free trial of Shudder / AMC+ to watch Skincare and decided to hold on to it for another month or two to binge-watch Dragula and a few other horror movies I’ve wanted to see. (Just what we need, another streaming service! Death by subscriptions, my funeral will cost $6.99/mo + ads.) Dragula is an alternative-horror drag competition, similar to that of Rupaul’s Drag Race but also, not at all. I’m a fan of Drag Race, but where Drag Race fails, Dragula picks up the pieces. Rupaul did a lot for the community and brought drag to the forefront of culture, and no one could take that away from him. But the Boulet Brothers’ definition of drag is a lot wider than that of an OG like Rupaul. Drag doesn’t have to simply be female illusion anymore and Dragula proves that. In this competition, they allow for cis-women, hetero men and trans folks to compete. (Rupaul has since come around on the trans thing, but in the past said that he felt like it was “cheating.”)

Revenge (2017)
on Shudder/AMC+

The Substance was one of my favorite movies that came out last year, so naturally, I wanted to watch the one other major movie Coralie Fargeat has done. It took me up until now to watch Revenge because, frankly, I was nervous. When you hear a movie is about a woman pushed so far to the edge to the point where she goes on a bloody, murder rampage, it makes you nervous about what they’re about to put this character through. I should’ve known a female director wouldn’t do me wrong! Yes, this is a r*pe-and-revenge movie but I guarantee if this were a male director, we would have to sit through a 20-minute gangbang scene that would make you wonder if he was getting off on it… Instead, the assault happens off-camera and it does not linger, because her being assaulted is not the only moment that pushes our main character, Jen, over the edge (literally). In the beginning, Jen is quite unlikable but the messaging becomes clear really quickly — she may be vapid, but there is no excuse for sexual violence and no person deserves what she goes through in the film.

There are a lot of stylistic choices in Revenge that mimic The Substance (the close-up body horror that makes you squirm in your seat, for one). Coralie Fargeat definitely has a unique vision and I look forward to seeing what she’ll do next!

Real Housewives of Salt Lake City, Season Finale
on Peacock

Wow, another ending to a fantastic season of Real Housewives. Salt Lake City continues to deliver. No notes! On their final day in Mexico, the ladies sit down to dinner at a *checks notes* luxury theme park. Whitney orders a pepperoni pizza which, for some reason, I found soo funny. In classic Housewives fashion, Heather attempts to “clear” “the” “air” with a fun “game” where she suggests each of them find the worst thing they’ve ever said about someone in the group, and let that person read it out loud. (“Check, please!” Angie jokes.) This has disaster written all over it. Most of the ladies handled it surprisingly well. (Bronwyn for instance, when Angie had texted that she married “a man with one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel” and wore a hot dog costume to remind everyone she “sucked her way to the top.” Yikes…) Some of the ladies copped out. Brittni, for instance, said the worst thing she texted about any of the ladies was that she would rather invite Bronwyn to tea, instead of Mary. (Mary responded, “When were we supposed to get tea?”) And don’t think it went unnoticed that Meredith squeaked out of this game the first chance she got. Of course, this little game ends in a full-on blow-out between Whitney and Lisa, with Angie catching a stray for some reason. The game was intended (allegedly) to allow the ladies to start fresh, but shockingly, it highlighted even more problems. I’m not sure where the ladies go from here…

Se7en (1995)
in theatres, rerelease

This year is the 30th anniversary of the movie Se7en, a movie I was pretty much obsessed with the moment I watched it as a kid. I was probably too young for it, but that’s how you build character! This movie introduced me to Dante’s seven deadly sins; pride, greed, lust, envy, gluttony, wrath, and sloth. (Tag yourself!!) In the movie, a serial killer is on the loose and his victims each represent one of the sins. Despite practically mouthing along to John Doe’s monologue in the end, I still felt the tension through the entire final act. In my opinion, this is one of the best-made thrillers and seeing it in a theatre was such a treat! It is a community bonding experience that I think we need back. So, support your local movie theatre every once in awhile, folks!

Some other things I watched this month:

• Get Away (2024), on Shudder - A fun little slasher romp! I wouldn’t go out of your way, but if you’re looking for a light-hearted, blood-filled movie while chilling at home, it’s a decent one.

• The Last Showgirl (2025), in theatres - So happy to see Pamela Anderson getting her flowers! This role was made for her and she did an amazing job. The movie itself was middle of the road for me though. Very beautifully shot, though.

• Skincare (2024), on AMC+ - Loosely based on the true story of Dawn DaLuise, a Hollywood facialist who was accused of plotting to kill a rival aesthetician. Elizabeth Banks and the soundtrack were great. I’m not sure the ending was as strong as the beginning.

• The Northman (2022), rewatch, on HBO Max - I was on an Eggers kick. If you are into the retelling of freaky old Nordic myths, this one is for you! Fun fact, the original story allegedly inspired Shakespeare’s Hamlet.

• Speak No Evil (2022), on AMC+ - Fuck, man. This movie is so much darker than the U.S. remake. (Also, we’re making remakes of two-year-old movies now?) Not to spoil anything, but it’s kind of funny how we feel the need to add an American Hero spin to everything. The original holds nothing back and really “goes there.”

• Real Housewives of New York City, Season 15 Finale, on Peacock - Another explosive finale for Housewives. Unfortunately, I don’t think it was enough to save this cast…

• Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone / Chamber of Secrets, rewatch, on Peacock - I’m rereading the Harry Potter books for the first time in a long while. I’ve since rewatched the movies countless times and have listened to the audiobooks once or twice, but I really felt compelled to reread them as an adult and even bought a secondhand paperback set to annotate. (Nerd!) After reading each book, I’m of course inspired to then watch the movie. I know it’s millennial cringe and yes, fuck JK Rowling, but a full decade of my childhood involved waiting for the next Harry Potter book to come out, followed then by the movie releases. This culture is ingrained in me, I’m afraid.

What I Read in January (If You Even Care!)

• A Certain Hunger by Chelsea G. Summers (2019), ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ - The feminine urge to murder your former lovers and eat their organs. <3

• Hamlet by William Shakespeare (1623), ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ - This was the play that got me to appreciate Shakespeare and I felt like revisiting it.

• Ripe by Sarah Rose Etter (2023), ⭐️⭐️⭐️ - This one is for the depressed girlies! A woman faces the dread that comes with living in a capitalist hellscape. Life do be like that!

• Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone / Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling (1997 / 1998), ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ - See above. I love magic and childlike wonder. Sue me!

• Where The Wild Ladies Are by Aoko Matsuda (2020), ⭐️⭐️⭐️ - A fun collection of short stories loosely based on Japanese folklore. I enjoyed some stories more than others, but it was a cool introduction to the country’s ghosts and monsters.

Cheers! 🥂