Horror Actressing: Anjelica Huston in "The Witches"
Tuesday, May 12, 2020 at 9:07PM by Jason Adams
What's your favorite flavor of witch? Do you prefer a goth punk madwoman like Fairuza Balk in The Craft? A sexy hyper-stylish artiste like Tilda Swinton in Suspiria? A cackling crone like Margaret Hamilton in The Wizard of Oz?
What if I told you you didn't have to pick just one? That there exists a witch out there already that snatches a dash of this, a dash of that, until her cauldron bubbles over with the cartoonish bombast of Cruella de Vil meets Helena Markos. I think you'd nod, say duh, throw your head back and holler, "Anjelica Huston as the magnificent Grand High Witch forever, darling-kk!!!"
Before 2020 became a pinball game of one-upmanship in the inexplicability department it could have been said that the most inexplicable thing out there was the fact that somebody in Hollyweird had gone and green-lit a remake of Nicolas Roeg's 1990 nearly-perfect adaptation of Roald Dahl's book The Witches. (I say "nearly perfect" because Dahl was right to despise the film's tacked-on happy ending, a real stinkeroo of a decision picked by that scariest beast of all, a test audience.)
However, given the way 2020's turned, a reboot of The Witches only ranks somewhere on the twelfth or thirteenth page of possible atrocities. And I say this with no ill feeling in my heart towards Anne Hathaway, the oft popular punching bag who's stepping into Huston's square-toed sensible Grand High Witch shoes -- I think Anne would probably be a fine choice for the part if, you know, we had a time machine and we could go back and erase all of the videocassettes that contained evidence of Miss Huston's exquisite turn.
But we don't, and anyway the folks at Warner Archive finally just released a beautiful print of the film on blu-ray a few months back as if to say alongside us no, never, we will never let Anjelica Huston's grand high Grand High Witch go.
Because perhaps you are a young person who doesn't know, or are yourself the parent of a young person who doesn't yet know. Who is to say? Well I am here to say. I am here to smack you upside the head with my tattered childhood copy of Roald Dahl's book, my favorite childhood book of all the books, to turn it to page whatever where that iconic drawing of the Grand High Witch first appears, arms flung high above her head, her rubber-masked face a kabuki scribble of wicked exhilaration, and to say to you, see? See there? Anjelica Huston already did that. She did all of that.
And a vitch who dares to say I'm wrong vill not be vith us very long!!!!
Reader Comments (20)
Love love love this film and love love love Anjelica Huston in this!! I often quote this in my everyday life!
Anjelica Huston only did good or very good movies for quite a long time. Not many actresses can say the same.
Jason -- what a great choicee for this series. She's so remarkable in this. I hav eno idea how Anne Hathaway thinks she's going to top this (and I love Anne Hathaway)
Seeing as how the scene referenced was the challenger of my movie scene battles on Monday, I am taking credit for inspiring this entry!
(Not really, but I love that this was done so close to my using the scene!)
I'm willing to give the remake the benefit of the doubt, mostly because of Anne Hathaway. She successfully differentiated herself enough with her Catwoman portrayal - and I think we can agree that Michelle Pfeiffer's performance in that is on the same near-perfect level as Ms Huston in this. I only shudder at the thought of them using CGI instead of practical effects.
Totally campy and commanding Grand High Witch. The Witches was my first introduction to the supreme talents of Anjelica Huston. She knows the role calls for camp and she delivered wonderfully and never falling into kitsch. I have only seen it once but I remember some specifics like when she was already on full witch mode/makeup and had to suddenly put the beautiful persona back. That was one hilarious bit I'll never forget.
I fucking love Anjelica Huston in that film. She was just all over the place and more. She made the film a joy to watch and it's probably Nicolas Roeg's most overlooked film considering the run he had in the 1970s to the mid-1980s as he made a series of highly-revered films.
If Queen Anne can bring that over-the-top kind of acting and be scary and cool, then we're in for a ride.
This performance haunted my childhood and I love her for it.
A wonderful post about a wonderful performance in a wonderful film.
Huston is regularly cited as perfection here (which she is) but I actually think the film hinges on the duet between her and Mai Zetterling (who is also perfection, managing to make human decency interesting and never boring).
Throw in Brenda Blethyn and Jane Horrocks doing great campy pantomime work and... yep, the only thing lacking a little is the ending...
Controversial opinion, I would have nominated her for this instead of the Grifters. I think it’s a legitimately brilliant performance, campy but terrifying, imaginative in a way that plays to the fantasies of children but with a texture and tone that’s perfect for adults. It’s the ultimate Dahl performance and film.
Angelica Huston is perfect in this movie! Which is damn near perfect in itself! It's also a very scary and harrowing movie, esp for the little ones - which makes it even better! Great choice for this series, Jason.
"You are in for a Tweet" such a funny line reading.
My childhood awareness of Anjelica Huston came about through the TV special on The Making of Captain EO. Her Supreme Leader character was referred to by host Whoopi Goldberg as the evil Witch Queen. When she tackled The Grand High Witch it just reinforced my association with her as someone who thrives playing lager than life macabre characters. It didn't help the following year she was Morticia Addams. Ultimately my childhood understanding of Anjelica Huston was in projects intended to scare children.
Me and Anne Hathaway share a birthday and birth year. So curious how she'll attempted to reinvent the wheel?
I love the mention of Fairuza Balk in The Craft but my favorite witch is without a doubt Anjelica Huston in The Witches.
This is actually one of my favorite performances of all time and I don't just would been nominated her for this role instead of The Grifters but actually would be my winner of that year.
She plays the role with funny-sexy-weird manerisms that makes believable she is not a real human.
I love Anjelica Huston so much.
Genius performance. Anjelica Huston was on fire in 1990: I love her in The Witches but I definitely worship her work in The Grifters: Lilly Is one of the greatest performance of all time.
The Grand High Witch and Morticia Addams will forever be Anjelica Huston’s. Just purely iconic. She’s hilarious, beautiful, over-the-top, sublime, and unforgettable as both.
Also, bonus points for one of my all-time favorite line deliveries in The Witches: The witch who has infiltrated the kitchen of the resort drinks the crest soup after the formula has been mixed in and turns into a mouse. She rushes out to the dining halls to warn them and upon reaching The Grand High Witch. Is immediately stepped on to the sound of a fart and Anjelica’s immortal delivery of “CHILD!”
It kills me every time. Bless you, Miss Huston!
What a great choice!
PoliVamp: Difference is: Hathaway did a pretty good (though not really all-timer great) version of an 80-90% comics accurate take while Pfeiffer was an all-time great performance...of something that had basically NOTHING to do with the comics version apart from costume. So: What can Hathaway do all that differently than Huston? Without the story becoming unrecognizable?
"You DARE to ARGUE with ME???" I actually prefer this performance over The Grifters (Annette shines a little brighter in that one).
I have vivid memories of afternoon viewings of this movie during family lunch parties when the kids had to go entertain themselves while the adults gossiped. As teen restlessness took over my older cousins and they would wander to other rooms and never finish the film, I often found myself watching 'til the very end alone and thank goodness cause I could never stop myself from mimicking Anjelica's scream just after delivering:
"YOU..YOU'REDOOMED,OLDWOMAN! YOU"REDOOMEDFOREVAH!"
I'm a conservative with regards to booking transformations; typically I like movies to be as precise to the first story as could be expected under the circumstances. I read "The Witches" again and again as a child and I was a little uncertain about this new film form despite the fact that I was eager to look at it. This film was totally extraordinary. The exhibitions were amazing regardless of whether a portion of the advanced pictures was missing, and the two driving female characters were depicted by a portion of my #1 entertainers. I didn't exactly concur with how much social editorial was incorporated, however, I thought generally it was a fascinating dislodging of the story's setting and it was totally all-around done. Very frequently books get excessively mutilated or distorted in their film renditions and I figure this film worked superbly of remaining consistent with the story while putting an advanced contort on its point of view.