Leah is a teenage girl who becomes increasingly frustrated with her newly widowed mother, who decides to relocate them both to an isolated house in the woods somewhere. Leah now finds herself more or less trapped in a house with an erratic mother, far away from her friends and the life she used to know. The frustrated teen gets her hands on a black magic book, and out in the woods nearby she ends up crossing a line she can never retrace back from.
Pyewacket is a supernatural horror/mystery thriller, directed by Adam MacDonald (who also directed the third season of the horror series Slasher). The “Pyewacket” was actually one of the supposed familiar spirits of a witch from back in 1644, where Matthew Hopkins (witchfinder general) accused her of witchcraft and had her arrested. It has later been referenced in novels and other media, including William Friedkin’s The Guardian (where the nanny brings a toy she calls “Pyewacket”).
Now, a plot concerning a frustrated teen wanting to kill her own mom with black magic, sounds a little bit cheesy perhaps. But this movie plays out the story in a very serious tone, and it works. Both the daughter and mother are portrayed in both a positive and negative light – they’re both grieving, but in different ways and separate from each other, but it’s obvious that they’re not really in tune with the other’s feelings and needs, and thus they’re both coming off as quite self-centered. While Leah finds comfort by hanging around with friends and dabbling in the occult, the mother wants to rid herself of everything that reminds her of her dead husband, thus forcing through the relocation to the house in the woods. This is where Leah eventually loses all her patience, and only wants to get rid of her own mother by using a black magic ritual.
Much of the excitement comes from not knowing exactly what is happening. Is there really a murderous supernatural entity, or is Leah imagining everything? One could probably define this movie as a little bit of a slow-burn, but instead of fizzling out in nonsense or nothingness, it delivers a final act that keeps your attention throughout. Much of the build-up is to ensure that the viewer understands the tension between mother and daughter, and to give Leah’s actions a bit more credence through proper character-building. Once Leah has performed the occult rituals, however, she quickly regrets everything…but of course, what’s done cannot be undone. Which is often the case when people commit actions in a fit of rage without thinking anything properly through, which is not an uncommon thing to find in broken family dynamics.
Overall, Pyewacket is an entertaining horror thriller that keeps your attention and manages to pack in a few chills.
Director: Adam MacDonald
Country & year: Canada, 2017
Actors: Laurie Holden, Nicole Muñoz, Chloe Rose, Eric Osborne, Romeo Carere, Bianca Melchior, James McGowan, Victoria Sanchez, Neil Whitely, Missy Peregrym
IMDb: www.imdb.com/title/tt5119116/
Kay needs to visit her old family home after receiving the message that her elderly mother Edna has gone missing. Bringing her daughter Sam with her, they both try to find clues which could help them figure out Edna’s whereabouts. Once inside the old country home, they soon find evidence all over the place regarding Edna’s increasing dementia. Post-it notes are found everywhere, with reminders of everyday things. After three days, Edna suddenly appears inside the house like nothing has ever happened, causing both tremendous relief for Kay and Sam, but also increased worry. The old lady’s behavior starts becoming more and more incomprehensible, and it feels like an ominous presence has taken control over her.
Linda inherits her mother’s Victorian mansion, located in the middle of the Australian dusty farmlands. It’s been remodeled as an retirement / nursing home, run by Connie and the doctor Barton. She’s quick to settle in, but it isn’t long before nightmares begin to haunt her, while some of the old people start to die in mysterious ways. She finds her mother’s diary that reveals one dark secret after another, and opens repressed memories. She begins to see a figure in her bedroom window, the water tap turns on by itself, the house cat begins to hunt shadows in the hallways, and candles seem to light up by themselves. One of the female nude statues in the garden has had one of her tits crushed. Much of what Linda is beginning to experience is the same thing her mother noted in her diary. Linda’s underlying paranoia skyrockets to eleven as she believes someone is tapping her phone late at night while she talks to her boyfriend, Barney, the only one she can barely trust.
Dr. Maitland is collecting esoterica, and one day the guy who is his regular source of such items offers him a skull that is supposedly the remains of Marquis de Sade. He soon discovers that the skull is possessed by an evil spirit who turns people into crazed killers.
The author Kathy Keen is on a trip in Bali, Indonesia, to do some research on an ancient black magic called Leák. She has already been to Africa where she learned about Voodoo, but she needs more material to fill her book on the subject of black magic. She gets help from a guy called Hendra, who’s got some knowledge of the local folklore, and he also soon becomes her love interest. He takes her to the obscure corners of the jungle where they meet The Queen of Leák, a crazy old witch with a cackling, screaming and over-the-top animated laugh. And it is obvious that the person who dubbed her voice had a really fun time in the recording studio. Anyway, it’s already hard to describe what’s going on here, but it’s something like this: the witch orders Catherine to take off her skirt so that the witch can tattoo something on her leg, using what looks like a long lizard tongue. If this sounds bizarre, you haven’t seen nothing yet. The tattoo is supposed to be a sign that Kathy is now an official student of Leák, and must come to her every night to learn more about this mysterious magic. And it’s straight down the rabbit-hole from here on, where Kathy and the witch dances like drunk hippies, transform themselves into pythons, flying screaming fireballs, and … pigs. You just saw that coming, right? And we get other things that include a flying head which you just have to see for yourself to believe.
