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lena-in-a-red-dress · 10 months

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I drove 5hrs to the beach today, and about 1hr in I was reminded of Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters (2013), and how I need to watch it again.

Which of course led me to the inevitable.

What if there was a Supercorp version?

Now, I know what you're probably thinking-- Kara and Alex as the siblings, Lena as the outlier white witch, right?

WRONG.

The answer is clearly Lena and Lex as the witch hunters and Kara as the outlier white witch. Because clearly Lex and Lena would be dope with the weapons and tech and tactics for hunting witches, and the idea of Lex being the one forced to stuff his face with sweets as a kid is just golden.

I think their dynamic would be the same as in the film-- mostly equal with Lena having the slight edge in authority. Mostly because she has a knack for knowing where witches are and how each one operates, and Lex learns to trust her judgment. Though most of the time they're on the same page to the point they know what each other are thinking and can finish each other's sentences.

Meanwhile Kara is the woman accused of being a witch who they save from the townspeople when they first arrive. She and Lena obviously have immediate chemistry, and Lena is definitely into Kara's interest in her, but is all about business first. Too many kids are going missing.

But things hit a snag when, after an altercation where Lex and Lena are separated, Kara finds Lex with mortal wounds, and uses her magic to heal him. When he finds out, his good nature towards her disappears and he regards her with nothing but contempt.

"You saved my life," he snarls, "so I won't kill you today. But if I see you again..."

The threat goes without saying.

"And fucking stay away from my sister."

Kara stays away for a while, but when she learns information vital to the search for the children, she has to risk the peace.

She finds them in the tavern, and though Lena smiles at the sight of her, Lex immediately draws his weapon.

"She's a witch," he tells Lena, anticipating her confusion.

In an instant, Lena's weapon is out and leveled at Kara, her expression cold and hard. Kara quickly lifts her hands.

"Do I look like a witch to you?"

Lena tilts her head towards Lex. "She has a point."

"Humans don't use magic."

Lena's head tilts the opposite direction, casting a long look at Kara. "He has a point."

"I saved his life, that's all," Kara reminds Lex. "Where I come from that would be cause for gratitude, not suspicion."

At that, Lena's eyes narrow. "Our instincts are the only reason we've survived this long," she says, voice razor sharp. She glares hard at Kara for a long moment, but then slowly releases the hammer on her pistol.

"But sometimes they're wrong." Thrusting the gun back in its holster, Lena turns her chin towards her brother, ready for his protest. "Not often," she says swiftly. "But sometimes."

"Lena..." Lex warns, holding out a few moments longer.

"Do you deny she saved your life?" Lena shoots back.

Lex scowls. "No," he admits, glaring at Kara like he'd rather she'd left him to die.

Lena is less bothered. She turns her chair backwards and sits astride it, resting her elbows on the table as she looks at Kara intently.

"So. Let's talk."

#supercorp #hansel & gretel witch hunters au

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haveyouseenthishorrormovie · 1 month

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SUMMARY: Brother/sister duo Hansel and Gretel are professional witch-hunters who help innocent villagers. One day they stumble upon a case that could hold the key to their past.

#hansel & gretel: witch hunters (2013)#fantasy horror #2010s #united states #north american movie #mentionable warning #child death #horror #movies #poll

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dcminions · 1 year

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FAMKE JANSSEN in HANSEL & GRETEL: WITCH HUNTERS (2013)

#famke janssen #hansel & gretel: witch hunters #witchesnet #femaledaily #olderfc #dailywomen #dailyflicks #cinemapix #cinematv #filmgifs #filmtvdaily #moviegifs #she could kill me thats fine

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filmesbrazil · 3 months

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#filme #filmes #film #movie #movies #cinema #joão e maria: caçadores de bruxas #hansel and gretel: witch hunters #hansel #joão #jeremy renner

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adarkrainbow · 7 months

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Spooky season fairytales (1)

I have been covering it these past weeks, and it is a perfect fit for Halloween: Hansel and Gretel.

This is one of the creepiest "popular" fairytales, that has terrified many children. The witch in the gingerbread house not only exemplifies so many bogeymen that caused children's nightmares, but is also one of the two most famous examples of witches in fairytales - and we know Halloween is one of the witchy holidays. And the whole story revolves around a house made of sweets - in modern day interpretations, Hansel and Gretel is THE candy-fairytale. And Halloween is THE holiday for treats and sweets.

Despite being an obvious choice to make fairytale horror movies, and the fairytale having inspired several great horror classics (the scene I posted before in Stephen King's IT involving the witch of Hansel and Gretel), the tale doesn't actually have a lot of treatment in the world of horror... Yeah, it is surprising, but the first true "horror movie" about Hansel and Gretel would be the Korean 2007 movie of the same name, that was recognized as a great Korean horror piece and a very touching tragic story, but is not an actual retelling of "Hansel and Gretel" - or rather it is a twisted, reversed-retelling that mostly uses Hansel and Gretel as a motif and reference rather than actual plot material.

To have "Hansel and Gretel" REALLY enter the horror movie world, we would have to wait for the year 2013, and a dual release. The first one is a famous movie by fairytale enjoyers, that is still quite popular online: "Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters". This movie is what the 2005's "Van Helsing" movie was to Dracula.

What to say about this movie? It is a dark fantasy, action-movie acting as a sequel to the original fairytale and depicting the two protagonists as gun-and-arbalet-wielding witch hunters. It is everything you except from a a big studio classic action gritty-fantasy movie. In fact, that's the main flaw of the movie: it is extremely generic, formulaic and "by-the-book". There's no real inventivity or uniqueness in terms of plot, setting or characters. If you played dark fantasy action video games, you watched this movie already. It didn't even invent the concept of Hansel and Gretel as witch hunters - Fables for example had done it already by making Hansel a fanatical Puritan witch hunter in the style of the Salem witch trials. As a result, what could have been a really good, inventive, interestng movie is just... a neutral, generic movie. The kind you can watch and enjoy but that won't transcend anything and isn't groundbreaking in any way.

Not that the movie is bad, it has some highlights and qualities to it that avoid making it bad. For example, several of the actors in this movie are really good and give their best despite playing bland or generic characters (and in fact it sames some flat characters, who are given depth by their actors' work) ; and there is a true visual work, with some fascinating designs. This all makes the movie enjoyable in several aspects - but just having good actors and good visuals won't make the movie good given how generic it is in plot and style, and how incoherent the worldbuilding and the tone feels, tiptoing around anachronisms for the sake of "let's make it cool and steampunk", and failing to find a balance between dark comedy and serious movie. (Oh yes and it also dreadfully suffer from the awful "3D movies" trend of the time)

And to this movie answered another movie: 2013's "Hansel and Gretel", aka The Asylum's Hansel and Gretel. A movie which is the perfect twin to "Witch Hunters" - in fact you could say they are the yin and yang to each other.

This movie is a full horror movie, not a dark fantasy/action piece. This movie is a retelling of the original story, not a sequel to it. This movie takes place in modern day, the 21st century, instead of a fantasized Germany of unclear era. And whereas "Witch Hunters" kind of fails at meeting the hype it built up, and is a neutral, average, not-good not-bad big budget movie, this movie is... surprisingly good for what it is, and ends up much better than what it should be.

If you do not know The Asylum, the group behind this movie, they are well-known producers of mockbusters, unofficial sequels and B-movies, and very proud of it. In fact it is their goal: make mockbusters to propose a cheaper alternative to big-studio movies, and turn the making of "second-rate" movies into a true art. They make their movies very fast, they release them against big studios movie they openly took inspiration from, they use cheap special effects, they select for actors either "no-names" or "has-beens"... I think I can sum it up enough by the fact they are the makers of the "Sharknado" movies. As a result, this movie was probably going to be an utter mess and ridiculous schlock...

... But it was surprisingly good. Better than what it should be. Of course The Asylum's marks are still there. The movie opens and closes on two very ridiculous scenes (the first victim's flight in the night ; the explosion of the house), there is some cheap "sexy-horror" audience-appeal (it is no mistake the only victims to be eaten are women that are forced in underwears before being pushed in the oven), and the plot is basically Hansel and Gretel X The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. BUT all that being said, this movie actually works! In its own, small-budget, no-real-ambition way. It doesn't try to be too snobby or arrogant - it knows it is a small, derivative, B-horror movie, and it stays in its lane. There are some interesting scenes and concepts (such as the drugged-colorfed nightmares). They do manage to create some disturbing elements - while also purposefully breaking several horror stereotypes and cliches. They try to keep a "maybe magic, maybe mundane" approach to the story in their own clumsy way but that is interesting. And more importantly - the character of the witch is SO GREAT!

I can't say enough how I enjoyed the witch (Lilith) on screen, and I do believe that this is due to the incredible work of her actress. Because she is played by none other than Dee Wallace (a horror movie regular who began her career with E.T.) - and she manages to make the character entertaining and disturbing. It really works, and I suspect that if a bad actress had been placed there, the role might have felt flat and generic. But she brings extremely well the disturbed state of mind, the humanity of the monster, and the true descent into horrible madness of the character. They are notably the first movie, to my knowledge, which actually acknowledges and reflects upon the special relationship between Gretel and the Witch, invoking elements that would later become common in "Hansel and Gretel" retellings, such as the witch wanting to make Gretel her "heir", or seeing her as a daughter substitute.

Beyond the year 2013, of course, now, you hit "Hansel and Gretel - horror" in any web research system, and you get the recent horror movie by Oz Perkins, the 2020's "Gretel and Hansel".

I do believe that this movie, and The Asylum's movie, truly reflect the two sides of horror movies and how one same story can be treated under these two lenses. The Asylum's is a gory, brutal, low-budget but decent and interesting horror movie, that still works in its limitations and intends to be just your random "fun little horror slasher movie" ; this movie is the artistic, big-budget, much more stylized and psychological disturbing horror movie that veers more into dark fantasy sometimes and tries more to be an actual nightmare, in the most abstract and eerie sense.

Personally, I did enjoy the movie as a whole and I think it is a good Hansel and Gretel movie. I do think they did a good job at mixing the fairytale with the entire Christian myth of the witch as built by the witch-hunts and other countryside superstitions (they weaved in the story for example the topics of the magical ointments and the idea of witches feasting on the dead) ; and I did love the dark twists and reveals at the end ; and I also liked very much the subtle references to other fairytales slid in the story (Little Red Riding Hood, and The Juniper Tree).

However it is not a movie without flaws - and I would never call it a perfect movie. It got the ideas, the visuals, the will, the inspirations, but... sometimes it does too much, there's unecessary things that could have been cut out and do ridiculize a bit the movie (the first third of the movie is filled with unecessary and random moments like the bizarre hostile man in the abandoned house, or the "mushroom" scenes, which clearly were not needed - there's also jumpscares that are just... there, for jumpscare sakes, when this movie clearly does NOT need jumpscares). There is also the fact that while often it manages to drive its themes, messages and topics in subtle or clever ways (the dialogues of Gretel and the witch, about things such as power, womanhood, the world, are all very well done), a few times it becomes suddenly very clumsy and awkward (one particular moment was the line of Gretel about "the system" in her very first scene, which felt definitively too political and modern to fit in the context).

I do remember the so-called "debate" there was when this movie was released, and the so-called "scandal" of putting Gretel's name first. But it makes full sense when you understand that Gretel here is the main character, that we are told the story through her, and that it doesn't try so much to be a Hansel and Gretel retelling, as rather a dark and morbid fantasy movie that uses the Hansel and Gretel tale as a driving plot to explore more things - the European witchcraft myth, the theme of "Faustian deals", etc, etc... And despite some clumsiness here and there that do flaw the movie (I haven't mentionned it, but the choice of the tattoos for the witch's "final" form seemed very random and ill-thought, which is one of the several little details that don't work ; balanced by details that do work, such as the idea of having a more modern architecture for the witch's house), it still works for most of its course.

To conclude this post, I need to talk about one last "Hansel and Gretel" movie. A movie which American audiences are not actually familiar with. Because it is a German movie, that got released around Europe (I saw it in French), but to my knowledge never crossed the Atlantic. Made by Anne Wild and written by Peter Schwindt, this movie is probably the eeriest Hansel and Gretel adaptation I have seen. It is not "disturbing", "shocking" or "horrifying" - it is just creepy and unsettling. It is not a rewrite or a "retelling" per se, because it stays faithful to the original tale and barely changes anything. Out of the five movies I present you, this is the most faithful movie when it comes to adapting the brothers Grimm fairytale.

EDIT: I originally wrote this part thinking the movie was very hard to find... TURNS OUT IT WAS POSTED ON YOUTUBE! The full movie is on Youtube - in its original German though

This movie made the fairytale eerie with two things. 1) Little unsettling and creepy details in terms of style and movie editing. This movie actually has several things in common with the 2020's Gretel and Hansel - such as the heavy use of the forested landscape to make one feel both lost and trapped at the same time (helped by the fact the protagonists are here played by actual children), and bizarre camera angles and movements (including disturbing close-ups and brutal cuts). The score also includes eerie songs and creepy children whispers, that add to the general spookyness. 2) A work on the realism on the tale. There's still magic and supernatural in there, definitively. But overall it is all... "realistic" in style, making it all more unsettling. Hansel and Gretel behave like actual children - and are in fact often unaware of the danger they are getting themselves into. The color palette is drab and lightless.

Don't get me wrong: this is not an adult-aimed movie, it is not a horror movie. It is still a kid-oriented, fairytale movie, with some moments of humor (though it is mostly dark humor, such as Hansel, blissfully unaware of the witch's plan, coming to enjoy his life in a cage eating good food all day long), a happy ending, and many beautiful visuals (the witch's bedroom is especially interesting - slight spoiler but there is the beautiful visual of the witch keeping petrified birds and butterflies in her room, that come back to life once she is dead). It has poetry to it - but it is definitively not a Disney movie and not what we usually think of as "fairytale movie for kids". It is a quite dark one.

One good illustration of this would be the family dynamic at the start of the tale, and how this movie slightly changes the whole abandonment episode. In this movie, the character of the mother is actually sick - and having her suffering from what will be a deadly disease puts her entire character into a very different light. Another major change they did is that the second time the children are abandoned - the parents do not hide the fact they are abandoning them. Hansel and Gretel know it, and the parents don't bother lying or even pretending, but there is still this sort of untold shame as they don't openly admit it and flee from their crying children... It hits hard.

The creepiest part of the whole movie is however, without a doubt, the witch. By gosh, this is one of the creepiest incarnations of the character I saw. She is a perfect embodiment of the uncanny valley: she is not some cartoonish monster, she is just this pale middle-aged woman that never blinks. She does perform magic, but her magic keeps with the "realism" style of the movie - no flash, no music, no smoke. When she teleports, she is just here one moment, another the next. She prevents Gretel from leaving by casting a spell that makes it so that each time she walks away, she ends up finding herself in front of the house - despite it being impossible. Her rhyming "Who's nibbling on my house?" is actually a disembodied whisper in the ears of the children as they see nobody, making their answer "It's just the wind" an actual comforting sentence they say to themselves thinking they imagined it all. Her bedroom cannot actually exist because it is located in an impossible part of the house that does not appear from the outside. And there are those little details that do hint at her maybe not being actually human but just looking like a human - when she moves sometimes her bones crack, and other times her voice seems to double itself in a strange echo... And when she is pushed into the oven (light spoilers too) - she doesn't scream. She doesn't make a sound. Once she is pushed and the door is closed, it is dead silence, and that makes it even more disturbing than if she actually screamed in agony.

And there are other little morbid details in the movie - too many for me too count. But one thing that does stick with me was the way Gretel pieced up together the witch's real intentions for Hansel (because of course she didn't tell them she was going to eat them), by noticing little details straight out of Pan's Labyrinth - such as Gretel noticing the witch's wind-chimes is made of bones and hair ; and the witch keeping in her house a closet filled with an ungodly amount of toys in various states of aging. This latter detail was notably taken back by "Gretel and Hansel", where the first hint of the witch's previous victims are toys scattered in the wilderness around the house. In fact, I do wonder if Perkins didn't take some inspiration from this 2005 movie, because there is definitively something similar between the two.

And with this, you have to my knowledge the perfect Hansel and Gretel movies for the spooky season.

The supernatural tragedy inspired by, and a famed piece of Korean horror. The surprisingly good B-horror movie that turns the story into a new "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre". The dark fantasy action-packed blockbuster that is just halfway there. The recent, heavily stylized, witch-hunt inspired artsy/socio-political horror movie. And the eerie, unsettling, faithful retelling as a dark German children movie.

#spooky season fairytales #spooky season #fairytale movies #hansel and gretel #dark fairytales #fairytale horror #horror fairytales #gretel and hansel #witch hunters

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dreamystarzkay · 1 month

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My Favorite Movies As A Goth

The Crow

Ginger Snaps

The Lost Boys

Van Helsing

Silver Bullet

Hansel & Gretel Witch Hunters

Hocus Pocus

Queen Of The Damned

The Nightmare Before Christmas

Beetlejuice

Killer Klowns From Outer Space

Rob Zombie's Halloween

House Of 1000 Corpses

Trick R Treat

Bram Stoker's Dracula

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didanagy · 8 months

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HANSEL & GRETEL: WITCH HUNTERS (2013)

dir. tommy wirkola

#hansel and gretel #hansel & gretel: witch hunters #jeremy renner #gemma arterton #tommy wirkola #famke janssen #pihla viitala

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jeremyleerennerdotcom · 1 year

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jeremy and gemma

daybreak february 2013

los angeles premiere january 2013

#jeremy renner #gemma arterton #hansel and gretel witch hunters #jlrgallery

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evenceflux18 · 10 months

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I don't know when am I able gonna finish this 10 page of my Hansel and Gretel Comic but eh, I guess here's the two page for it

(Kinda bumbed cause my computer file is corrupted AND MY THREE COMIC PAGE OF IT WAS RUINED AHHHHHHH!)

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2ndaryprotocol · 1 year

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The hellaciously fun action/horror hybrid ‘Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters’ hit theaters this week 10 years ago. 🍬🧙🏼‍♀️☠️

“𝚆𝚑𝚊𝚝𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚛 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚍𝚘, 𝚍𝚘𝚗'𝚝 𝚎𝚊𝚝 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚏*𝚌𝚔𝚒𝚗' 𝚌𝚊𝚗𝚍𝚢.”

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lena-in-a-red-dress · 9 months

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Hansel & Gretel Witch Hunters AU

So, Lena as Gretel is the daughter of a grand white witch, right? Which means the grand dark witch is hunting her heart for the ritual. The grand dark witch being Rhea, of course.

I like the idea of Mon-el being the asshole sheriff who tries to turn the town against Lena, Lex, and even Kara. Sowing violence and mistrust so that his mother can act with impunity. He's totally human tho, like his dad. Rhea barely tolerates him but for the role he serves.

When Lena and Lex are separated following the witches' raid on the town, they eventually find their way back to each other by stumbling upon their old childhood home. They barely recognize it, but they know that's a witch's lair in the cellar. And Lena, who has been putting the pieces together, tries to tell him what she suspects, but before she can Rhea arrives, reveals Lena's nature as a witch, and knocks them both senseless. When Lex regains consciousness, Lena is gone.

When Kara offers her knowledge and help to stop Rhea (and save Lena), Lex isn't in a position to refuse. With her help, and the book of light spells they find in the lair, they gain just enough of an edge that Lex stands a chance of getting his sister back.

At the ritual site, Lena is tied up for the slaughter. Rhea monologues in front of the other witches who have congregated, waiting for the blood moon eclipse to begin. As the eclipse draws closer, Lena starts to feel a new power build within her-- her own magic swells, itching to be released.

Lex arrives and starts blasting witches' heads off. In the commotion, Kara scurries through the fray to cut Lena loose. But the ropes are thick, and Kara's knife is small. As she saws through the ropes, Lena spots Rhea marching towards them with murder in her eyes.

"Must hurry, must hurry--" Lena mutters, trying to keep her cool.

"I'm almost-- there!" Kara cries, ducking aside as the ropes split apart and Lena surges from the altar to meet Rhea on her feet. Kara tosses her the knife as she goes, and Lena catches it deftly before swiping at Rhea with the blade.

Rhea easily dodges, snarling. Even after Lex flips her a weapon (her favorite crossbow), though, landing single scratch on Rhea proves difficult. She is a grand witch, after all.

Knocking Lena to one side, Rhea looks up to find the blood moon has passed. Her chance to complete the ritual is gone, and won't return for another generation. With Lena still recovering from the last blow, Rhea whirls towards Lex, and slashes her wand through the air between them.

Lena looks up just in time to see the spell gather on the tip of Rhea's gnarled wand, aimed straight for her brother. She screams.

"NO!"

At her cry, a snarled mess of roots pulls from the ground as though bidden, twisting themselves into a savage point that pierces through the back of Rhea's head to protrude through her mouth, widening until the constraint of her gaping teeth halts its growth.

It's too late. Even as Rhea falls limp, hanging lifelessly from the giant thorn of twisted vines, her spell leaves her wand and blasts into Lex's chest. He drops to the ground like a marionette whose strings have been cut.

"Lex!" Lena scrambles to her feet, dashing towards her brother, skidding to her knees beside him. She cradles Lex to her chest, looking to Kara for help. "Please!" she begs. "Please save him!"

Kara can only shake her head. "I can't. He-- He's already gone..."

Horror washes over Lena as reality sets in. After so many years of having only her brother, of protecting him, loving him-- he's gone. She's lost the one person in the world who never left her.

She's alone.

Grief rises sharp and hot within her. Tears fill her eyes as her ears roar. Emotion overcomes her, blinding them both to the unnatural sounds of bony joints clicking out of place behind them as Rhea's limbs begin to bend the wrong way, gripping the roots piercing her skull and climbing off them like a beetle.

By the time Rhea stands her skull has rebuilt itself. Instead of reaching for her wand, her fingers close around the ritual dagger, intent on taking advantage of the distraction of Lex's death to finish the last remaining Luthor sibling.

Just as she draws the knife back to strike, Lena's power surges through, amplified and made unstoppable by Lena's heartbreak as she sobs.

"No!" she screams to the void, sobbing. "NO!"

Her power blasts out of her in every direction, a bright white light that blinds Kara and saturates their surroundings with warmth and love. The force of Lena's magic halts Rhea in her tracks, and ultimately eats her away to nothing. The dagger drops harmlessly to the ground with no one the wiser.

When the light fades and Lena sags, suddenly spent, hopelessness nearly overcomes her. But then Lex sucks in a lungful of air, audibly gasping as he jerks back to life. Kara can only stare as Lena cries out in joy and relief, wrapping her brother in a fierce hug while Lex reels.

Kara has never seen anything like it. Somehow, Lena's power was enough to pull a life back after death had already claimed it. Truly, Lena is a grand white witch.

In the aftermath, Lex and Lena receive their payment and head off to their next adventure. Kara doesn't see them off from the village-- after all, the townsfolk had nearly murdered her. But her heart is still heavy as she sits in the forest outside her lonely cottage. The woods suddenly feel much smaller than they had before she'd met Lena...

"Hey."

Kara looks up to see Lena leaning against a tree, her crossbow slung over one shoulder. Lex stands with a horse and cart just a bit beyond, his features largely unreadable but not nearly so distrustful as they had been a few days ago.

Kara looks back at Lena in time to see a lazy smirk curl the woman's features.

"You coming?"

#supercorp #hansel & gretel witch hunters au #guess what i rewatched tonight #it was delightful #unrated cut is not my fave #but it got the job done #i now want *all* the hansel and gretel witchhunter content #guess ill have to do it myself

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