The Cleansing

Let's spoil this right off. First, most people in the 14th century could NOT read. This included the priest. Books were NOT plentiful because scribes had to write/copy them. Alice would not have burned the book due to most likely not even knowing what it was nor would her family have owned one. Second, no one went into plague houses and killed anyone. The people locked themselves in their houses and died. It wasn't until later that people went in and removed the rotting corpses for burning. Monty Python, "Bring out your dead!" This was true. Third, witches were not persecuted during the plague. Mostly it was the Jews. Fourth, the bird mask didn't come into being until the 17th century. Fifth, (and this actually deals with the movie) if the man who was caring for Alice already knew who she was, why did he care for her? Why did he teach her if his plan was to kill her all along? If he was so afraid of the plague, why didn't he check Alice and the guy who showed up? Why did he kill him in such a "ritualistic" way? What was he smoking/eating to have visions? That's not something men would have known as women were the gatherers of the time. The movie would have been better had the writers stuck to a more historical accuracy. I gave this a 5 as it entertained me, but caused me to really think about how much better it would have been.

This movie is far better than an average rating of mere 4.4. It's a pleasant coincidence that I stumbled upon this movie today. Someone expecting malevolent spirits haunting the village or a teenage witch chanting mantras in the middle of a forest with a candle burning next to a human skull, will be sorely disappointed. It is as much about science and religious dogma as much as it is about not turning the other cheek and let go the perpetrators of evil scot-free.

The Cleansing seems to have arrived in a wave of moody folk-horrors rushed out following the success of The Witch (Robert Eggers; 2015) The plot is fairly solid. A young girl is a accused of being a witch and its up to the village "cleanser" to determine whether she is and cleanse her of her curse. The film is a slow burn through the first two-thirds, but picks up pace in the final act. It's atmospheric and well shot, with a decent score that underpins the mood, but doesn't show much variation. At times, this score is a bit too much and there are definitely moments which would benefit from either no background score or something more subtle. The acting in the most part, and across the lead roles, is solid. The dialogue, on the other hand, has some questionable moments which feel clumsy and insincere. As the film reaches its finale, the pace rapidly picks up, but at the same time some of the performances take a nose dive. There is at least one death which strongly channels Hot Fuzz 'am-dram' Romeo & Juliet, but unironically. Overall, it's a film built on a neat story, which takes its time to build a decent atmosphere, but is ultimately let down by some inconsistent performances. Still worth a watch if you have the time.

The mother is never tortured, she is however murdered within the first five minutes. Her daughter Alice is tortured and goes through the witch trials. And the cleanser has nothing to do with the torture.

I loved this little low-budget gem and you will too once you get involved with it. It's a bit slow for some folks. The heroine is not real verbose however her face tells more than a bunch of dialog and let's face it, her face is quite alluring. Where was I? On to the movie review. There's a lot of tension because of Tom the reverend not wanting to give up the chase so it's always in the back of your mind about what might happen at any given time. The fellow from Africa gives this a bit of a spin on things even though at first it seems as if Hollywood is trying to inject its usual liberal garbage as you wonder if the next shoe to drop will be Climate Change, but nope, there's a reason. The strange part is the Cleanser himself as you will have to make up your mind whether or not it strains the ending a bit or if it's really worth it. I really liked the ending even it was a bit predictable with all of the gore. Regardless, just grab some popcorn, fasten your seat belt and get set to have a little fun.