Seven years ago, director Robert Eggers caused a stir with his dreary horror film The Witch. Long, quiet shots combine with eerie events. Something malicious creeps through the film, but it cannot be grasped. The Witch is an extremely uncomfortable film experience.
The German-Austrian production Hagazussa – The Witch’s Curse, which was released in cinemas in 2018, takes a similar approach currently available on Amazon Prime is. If you want to know what’s possible in the local cinema, we recommend taking a look at this idiosyncratic, unwieldy horror film.
What you need to know about Hagazussa on Amazon Prime
The plot of Hagazussa in a nutshell
Hagazussa – The Witch’s Curse takes you to 15th century Austria. Here we meet the goatherd Albrun (Celina Peter), who lives with her mother (Claudia Martini) in a lonely hut in the mountains. It is a lonely, quiet life – and becomes even lonelier when Albrun’s mother dies.
You can watch the trailer for Hagazussa here:
Hagazussa – The Witch’s Curse – Trailer (German) HD
Years later, Albrun (Aleksandra Cwen) has a child of his own, but lives without a husband. That’s why she is excluded from the village community referred to as a witch. Little by little, Albrun begins to suspect that something is wrong with her. Strange things are happening in the mountains.
Hagazussa: Oppressive Horror on Amazon Prime
The horror in Hagazussa – The witch’s curse develops slow and painful. For a long time, the camera observes people and nature – and above all, how people move through nature. The Alpine panorama appears sublime, but at the same time the powerful images radiate something depressing and threatening.
Hagazussa – The Witch’s Curse is a film that relies entirely on its atmosphere. This isn’t a wild, fast-paced horror trip that relies on surprising shock effects. Instead, director Lukas Feigelfeld conjures up a feeling for the film through the slowness of what is shown dark shadows on the horizon up.
As is often the case in horror films, the scariest thing is not the supernatural events, but the people. In Hagazussa – The Witch’s Curse they will driven by fear. Every encounter creates more mistrust. The world of the film seems like a prison. Despite the vastness of the landscape, there is no escape.
You have to get involved with Hagazussa – The Witch’s Curse, no question. The film keeps us on the edge of our seats for a whole 102 minutes. The attentive observations of the eerie loneliness in the Alps However, they also have a hypnotizing effect that surprises and disturbs with their silence.
This article was first published in a similar form on Moviepilot in March 2022.
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