Adelaide’s review published on Letterboxd:
Much like my last watch of Midsommar, The Witch is a much more complicated tale of freedom for the female lead than it appears on the surface. There is no denying the sense of freedom and relief that washes over Thomasin as the music swells and she rises in the air with her fellow witches as the screen cuts to black... yet she protests throughout the film that she is not the witch and she's right.
Like Midsommar, the rise of the female protagonist is often done with a deliberate goal in mind, manipulated on along the way by a malignant force that desires this end result. The family at the heart of this film is led by a prideful patriarch who believes he is more righteous than those around him and his actions leads his family to exile and a harder life. None of the family are saints and all wrestle with their own sins, but its important that Thomasin's first spoken lines are her seeking forgiveness as opposed to her father's brash assertions. Consistently throughout the film, Thomasin is the one who outwardly takes ownership of her actions and tries to find forgiveness, whereas the others hide the truth until its too late.
Its this family festering in sin yet claiming to literally holier than thou that the devil seeks to break down and destroy with the ultimate triumph turning the most sincerely devout, Thomasin. The mother lays all faults upon Thomasin and the twins craft lies that alienate her further, feeding into a cycle where blame of witchcraft comes back to her. The devil as Black Phillip is filling these ideas in the twin's heads and as the rabbit he spooks the horse separating Thomasin and Caleb in the woods. Heightening the antagonism towards her and as it reaches its fevered pitch, the time comes to truly break the family. After all their false claims of witchcraft, it is a witch that finally kills the twins. The father who had used chopping wood to process his failings instead of seeking to truly better himself dies under it after wrestling with the literal devil and failing. And the mother, who had been laying so much guilt and blame upon Thomasin is finally killed by her after she is driven too far.
In the end, I have a new appreciation for a different read on this film, but I also ask myself why I had latched so tightly to the freedom felt in this movie and Midsommar by the female's supposed empowerment. It's a question of how much of each was driven by manipulation by forces seeking a desired end and how much is true empowerment made by individual choices.
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