It's a message movie and it resonates. Willful belief in absurdities plagues the town of Salem, Massachusetts, in 1693. A handful of young girls, caught dancing in the woods, begin to claim they were possessed by the devil and they make accusations of witchcraft. It leads to more than twenty hangings and other deaths by execution.
When Arthur Miller wrote the play in the early 50s, it was his way of speaking out against the communist witch hunts of his time. And indeed the trajectories of the movements bear similarities. It starts with someone craving attention, first blaming someone who is not only harmless but marginalized -- insane people, the senile, the very poor. Then it leads to overreach. The dozen hysterical girls of Salem begin to claim that spirits of a higher caliber have haunted them at night -- the spirit of the preacher's wife, for instance, which goes a little too far.
Historically, Senator Joseph McCarthy began with real spies and real suspects but his claims grew more and more outrageous until he inspired the John Birch Society to consider President Eisenhower nothing more than "a communist dupe." And then McCarthy accused the US Army and General George Marshall of harboring communists. It was all a bit much for the less than insane among our own citizenry.
Now, of course, we can all cluck out tongues at such fantasies -- while presidential candidates now running would build an unscalable wall across the Mexican border and hunger for a wall across the Canadian border as well. The president is a gypsy changeling from Africa. Our strongest leaders turn into carnival barkers and we cheer them. That's not to mention worms in McDonalds' hamburgers. I guess -- I hope -- the less insane among us will reintroduce us to reality some day.
In any case, that's the end of my spiel. I will now stand down from the speaker's platform if someone will give me a hand. Thank you, but you don't have to be so eager.
The acting and the milieu are finely done. Winona Ryder does very well as the lustful young traitor and she handles the stylized speech all right. It's only when she's excited that a bit of Wynona, Ohio, peeps through Abigail Williams.
In 1693, these were all Brits, not Americans. So Paul Scofield can enter the movie as a judge who wants to be fair but is himself possessed by his interpretation of the Bible and his loyalty to what he perceives God to be. Those baggy eyes and that pebbled chin are just villainous enough.
Joan Allen as an innocent victim is a fine actress but she doesn't have much to do except look made of stone. Make up has turned her face sere and gray. Daniel Day-Lewis is one of the better actors of his generation but he's stuck in the part of the audience proxy -- the man of principle, guilty only of having boned Winona Ryder in the barn, who sees through the fraudulence of the accusations, the trial, and the ensuing executions. He sees the foolishness. We can see it too, even if we can't see our own.
There's a much less lavishly budgeted story of the witch trials around too, "Three Sovereigns For Sister Sarah," I think. It's well worth catching.
When Arthur Miller wrote the play in the early 50s, it was his way of speaking out against the communist witch hunts of his time. And indeed the trajectories of the movements bear similarities. It starts with someone craving attention, first blaming someone who is not only harmless but marginalized -- insane people, the senile, the very poor. Then it leads to overreach. The dozen hysterical girls of Salem begin to claim that spirits of a higher caliber have haunted them at night -- the spirit of the preacher's wife, for instance, which goes a little too far.
Historically, Senator Joseph McCarthy began with real spies and real suspects but his claims grew more and more outrageous until he inspired the John Birch Society to consider President Eisenhower nothing more than "a communist dupe." And then McCarthy accused the US Army and General George Marshall of harboring communists. It was all a bit much for the less than insane among our own citizenry.
Now, of course, we can all cluck out tongues at such fantasies -- while presidential candidates now running would build an unscalable wall across the Mexican border and hunger for a wall across the Canadian border as well. The president is a gypsy changeling from Africa. Our strongest leaders turn into carnival barkers and we cheer them. That's not to mention worms in McDonalds' hamburgers. I guess -- I hope -- the less insane among us will reintroduce us to reality some day.
In any case, that's the end of my spiel. I will now stand down from the speaker's platform if someone will give me a hand. Thank you, but you don't have to be so eager.
The acting and the milieu are finely done. Winona Ryder does very well as the lustful young traitor and she handles the stylized speech all right. It's only when she's excited that a bit of Wynona, Ohio, peeps through Abigail Williams.
In 1693, these were all Brits, not Americans. So Paul Scofield can enter the movie as a judge who wants to be fair but is himself possessed by his interpretation of the Bible and his loyalty to what he perceives God to be. Those baggy eyes and that pebbled chin are just villainous enough.
Joan Allen as an innocent victim is a fine actress but she doesn't have much to do except look made of stone. Make up has turned her face sere and gray. Daniel Day-Lewis is one of the better actors of his generation but he's stuck in the part of the audience proxy -- the man of principle, guilty only of having boned Winona Ryder in the barn, who sees through the fraudulence of the accusations, the trial, and the ensuing executions. He sees the foolishness. We can see it too, even if we can't see our own.
There's a much less lavishly budgeted story of the witch trials around too, "Three Sovereigns For Sister Sarah," I think. It's well worth catching.