Yahoo News Why Anjelica Huston's Grand High Witch is an anti-heroine for the ages
Hubble, bubble, Hollywood’s in trouble – the witches are coming. Not the ones with silly black hats and broomsticks… This is about real witches.
We are, of course, talking about Roald Dahl’s fantasy novel. Released in 1973, The Witches follows an eight-year-old boy and his grandmother as they fight against a child-hating coven who plot to turn the world’s kids into mice.
The tale terrified an entire generation of children not once but twice thanks to the 1990 big-screen adaptation by the late Nicolas Roeg. Now it’s about to be a third time, as Back to the Future director Robert Zemeckis is helming a cinematic remake alongside producers Jack Rapke, Alfonso Cuarón and Guillermo del Toro.
Safe to say that’s one heck of a team – but perhaps the detail that’s got those pointed chins wagging the most is the casting of Oscar winner Anne Hathaway as the coven’s leader, the Grand High Witch.
As we wait in anticipation to see how Hathaway will fare in the role, we can’t help but look back at the original on-screen portrayal, played to perfection by fellow Academy Award winner Anjelica Huston.
With her arched eyebrows, raven hair and pale skin, the actress has become somewhat of a goth-girl icon, from her role as the wicked stepmother in Andy Tennant’s Ever After to her iconic depiction of Morticia in The Addams Family. But her most defining character was without a doubt the chic yet shocking Eva Ernst.
Some have argued that this original cinematic depiction was a little dated in its approach to witch culture – yes, it's a thing – showing them as disfigured villains whose only sisterhood is expressed via their plan to destroy the young.
It’s certainly pretty drastic compared with the grunge-girl swag of Andrew Fleming’s The Craft (1996), the cute and kind mysticism of Sabrina the Teenage Witch, or the supreme hex appeal of Fiona Goode in the more recent American Horror Story: Coven.
But if we throw on some purple-hued contacts and look beyond the fear of women who wear gloves and avoid pointy shoes (forget the child-hating bit for a minute), The Witches is actually a fine example of female power and independence. Yes, the Grand High Witch is a repugnant beast who wishes for the death of all children, but she’s also one hell of a boss bitch.
Roeg introduced to us not one, but hundreds of powerful women, at a time when a new wave of feminism was dominating modern culture. While the general public were starting to change their thinking about women in positions of power, men still held the reins in parliament and business, and the gender wage gap was roughly 25%.
The film and the book alike disregarded these struggles – in Dahl’s reality, witches are demons who dress as women. The Witches redresses the balance by forgetting about the oppression inflicted by the patriarchy and putting women front-and-centre – as well as beside, behind and pretty much everywhere.
As proven by Luke (Jasen Fisher), it’s impossible to hide from the coven… particularly when you inadvertently smell like dog’s droppings.
Leading these dominant female figures is Huston’s Grand High Witch, a woman who is repugnant, vile and completely heinous, and yet somehow we find ourselves, dare we say it, admiring her. This was the conflict many of us felt when we first caught a glimpse of Huston in all of her made-up glory.
The Telegraph described this conflict well, stating that the character has great power (even if she does want to use it to eliminate all children): “As evidenced here, women in Roald Dahl’s world can be evil as well as saintly – but not in the tired old Madonna vs whore way they so often have been throughout our cultural history.”
In short, they have agency.
This couldn’t ring truer than for The Witches, in which the lead character is described as being the most powerful person in the world, and is the only one linking the secret societies of demonic witches across the globe. Huston filled the role with a depiction that is elegant, mesmerising, strong and terrifying.
She’s at once attractive and repulsive. She wears thick layers of red lipstick and blue eyeshadow, donning tight black silk and even silkier, dark hair – but her put-together appearance has nothing to do with attracting a man.
Most importantly, in the film she gathers the British coven at Hotel Excelsior to assemble a stronghold of businesswomen, using the experience to share her incredibly innovative Formula 86 delayed-action mouse-maker potion, calling on the brilliance of these independent women and sharing her wisdom freely to help push the idea along and establish it as a widespread solution to their burgeoning problem.
Okay, so their ‘problem’ is children and their ‘solution’ is to turn them all into mice. But ageist genocide aside, the book in the '70s and the subsequent film in the '90s painted a strong picture of female solidarity and tenacity.
Plus, let us not forget that the true hero to Huston’s anti-hero is Luke’s grandmother Helga (Mai Zetterling), who is atypical in every way. Just the fact that a vengeful OAP is the one to defeat these demonic figures shows the ingenuity of the narrative.
Together the characters showcase the traits women have to offer beyond the constraints of being a (man's) mother or a lover: they’re strong, smart, ambitious and resourceful. Most importantly, they’re independent and they’re led by an almighty force.
Anne Hathaway certainly has some mighty big square-ended boots to fill if she wants to bring half of the charisma Huston did to the role. While Zemeckis has gathered a solid team for the job, himself included, the OG Grand High Witch is apprehensive to say the least.
Speaking to Entertainment Weekly, Huston admitted she “[didn't] really know why” an updated version was in the works, adding: “I think Nick Roeg made the ultimate Witches… Frankly, best of luck to them. I hope it works. I just can't imagine anyone trying to remake that particular [film]. Maybe it’s a good idea for this generation.”
If Roeg made the ultimate Witches, Huston made the ultimate Miss Ernst. Where could the franchise possibly go from there? Well, according to Variety, the remake will be more rooted in the original source material, so that’s reassuring. Hopefully Hathaway will do Huston justice and the commentary of female solidarity, however confusing it might be, is not lost within Zemeckis’s modern spin on the classic tale.
And, more importantly, hopefully it has the ability to scare the new generation of kids like it did us. Because when it came to the original, quite literally, the gloves were off.
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