Thirteen months after Robert Eggers' directorial debut THE WITCH creeped out the audience at its Sundance premiere, the movie's going to get the opportunity to creep out a much wider audience, as distributor A24 has set a February 26, 2016 release date for the film.
Eggers won the Best Director Prize in the U.S. Narrative Competition at Sundance for the way he told THE WITCH's story:
A colonial family leaves plantation life and attempts to reap their harvest on a fledgling farm at the edge of an imposing ancient New England forest. Soon, superstition and dread set in as food grows scarce, a family member goes missing, and the children's play takes on a frenzied and menacing undercurrent. As they begin to turn on one another, the malevolent machinations of an ethereal presence from within the woods exacerbate the growing corruption of their own natures.
Judging from the trailer, Eggers did indeed capture some incredible imagery in his first film, while almost managing to create an atmosphere thick with dread. This looks like it could be a rather uncomfortable movie to watch… which is a compliment for a horror film.
THE WITCH stars Anya Taylor-Joy, Ralph Ineson, Kate Dickie, Harvey Scrimshaw, Ellie Grainger, and Lucas Dawson.