Drawing heavily from the 70s Italian horror masters, Anna Biller's The Love Witch is a modern technicolor dream, a vibrant and fierce feminist vampire story. A beautiful and young witch, Elaine, is a woman who struggles to find a man that will love her for more than her visual appeal. In her gothic-technicolor infused apartment she creates spells and potions, picking up various men with her powers of seduction. Elaine is convinced that fulfilling a man's needs through physical lust is the only way for a woman to find love, but when her potions begin to work to well she ends up with men who become very sensitive, leading them to become victims of Elaine's wraith. Anna Biller's The Love Witch is a highly entertaining experience, a film that goes for broke in its lavish technicolor aesthetic, capturing the look and the feel of the era in cinema while being both satirical yet appreciative as it comments on various aspects of our patriarchal-based society. Female sexuality is one fascinating themes of The Love Witch, as the film draws parallels between witchcraft and really any religion, all of which were established through patriarchy and a very barbaric perspective of female sexuality. One example of this is the presumed leader of Elaine's witch clan, a male,who explains to Elaine that woman must seek their empowerment through their visual beauty. There is also a scene where the townsfolk in a bar begin to go chant "Burn the Witch" a rather obvious parallel to the Salem Witch trails which saw many woman burned alive for reasons completely out of their control. Through Elaine's journey in a film that features intentionally stoic action, cold line delivery, and a borderline exaggerated reality in the way men and woman communicate, The Love Witch explores how empowerment through sexuality is still a form of feminine oppression, in the sense that they are doing something more for someone elses wishes than their own. This is a film that essentially flips the stereotypical gender roles, exposing the absurdity on both sides of the toughness of masculinity and the sensitivity of femininity, butt make no mistake The Love Witch also flips the script on the typical consequences of our perceived patriarchy. Using her love potions, Elaine is doing the exact same thing that men do, when they treat woman simply for their bodies. Elaine stripes of their free will as they fall madly in love with her, having her way this time instead of males when it comes gender roles. The reason one simply can't deny that the film acknowledges the stupidity of these pre-defined gender roles, cutting both ways, is Elaine's comment after her first lover, a college professor becomes incredibly emotional about his love for her, calling him "a pussy", annoyed by his constant emotional state. While this film may sound too dense for many viewers I couldn't recommend it enough just on a pure comedy, satire level, as Anna Biller has crafted a very enjoyable throwback film that's script is sharp and gleefully stoic.
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AuthorLove of all things cinema brought me here. Archives
June 2023
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