Seasonings of the Witch....Recipes for a Medieval BBQ?

SEASON OF THE WITCH (2011)

• Starring: Nicolas Cage, Ron Perlman, Stephen Campbell Moore, Ulrich Thomsen, Stephen Graham, Christopher Lee, Claire Foy
• Director: Dominic Sena

How long will it be before Nicolas Cage fans wake up and realize he is only doing it for the money?  Or til Nic picks better projects for himself?  Not that he overacted, looked overly concerned or postured any more than usual in this medieval religious occult supernatural adventure feature.  But maybe Season of The Witch should have been a direct to DVD release....and I'm sure if they had not spent so much money it would have been.  

Starts off exciting enough; some witches are hung and then drowned in the river while the priest attempts to recite some latin poetry that would quiet their witchy souls forever.   Until one of them magically leaps up and the games begin.  

Flash forward to an almost humerous montage of Nicolas and sidekick Ron Perlman as 14th century knights on the holy crusade.  They 'Rambo' and 'Terminator' the 'infidels' and then always end up drinking and womanizing in the pubs, as all good Christians should do after a hard day's killing, right?.  That is until they suddenly, like, after 12 years, get a conscience and split, defect, run away, quit that old Church's army.  

Sneaking back into old England back then wasn't as easy as one might think and the two are busted in town, in a stable of all places, and coerced by the Church to go on a dangerous mission (hey, they had a choice..... mission or die by hanging and/or burning).  They are enlisted to escort a young woman (Claire Foy), suspected of being a witch and for bringing the Plague to Europe, to a church 6 days hard journey away where she is to get a fair trial.  Yeah, right....fair trial for the Plague-causer.


Christopher Lee has a cameo as the Cardinal 'plagued' by the disease himself, with grossly disfigured face, who dispenses of the two deserters on their mission of doom.

The rest of the movie is just basically an anti-climatic mediocre medieval road trip; not even near as entertaining as Shrek and Donkey on the road.  Stupid stuff keeps happening, like a pack of wolves, dead bodies in pits, and a couple of the crew die.  Duh!


We are hoping to see some type of redemption in Nicolas Cage.  But, alas, not even the momentary appearance of (SPOILER ALERT!) a demon, who looks like he came out of the movie Alien, dispelling the notion that the girl was a witch, but validating that there is good and evil, does anything to bring Nicolas back closer to God or the church before he meets his end (Hey, I said SPOILER ALERT didn't I?).

Let's just say a few Ron Perlman one-liners keep us awake, but some so-so CG effects and no get-up-and-go leave us wishing we could have our 2 hours back.  Or see this movie burn at the stake.

Loaf of Bread: a so-so mediocre movie