Enter a Rotten Tomatoes movie slug to inspect the stored movie, batches, snapshots, and reviews.
Movie ID: 1162
RT slug: the_witches_2020
RT URL: https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_witches_2020
Release year: 2020
Runtime: 105 mins
Wide release date: —
Limited release date: —
Festival premiere date: —
Streaming release date: 2020-10-22
Tomatometer final: 50%
Audience score final: 32%
Genres: Adventure, Comedy, Fantasy
Directors: Robert Zemeckis
Writers: Guillermo del Toro, Kenya Barris, Robert Zemeckis
Producers: Alfonso Cuarón, Guillermo del Toro, Jack Rapke, Luke Kelly, Robert Zemeckis
MPAA rating: PG
Executive Producers: —
Created: 2026-08-13 11:19:27
Updated: 2026-08-13 11:19:27
In late 1967, a young orphaned boy goes to live with his loving grandma in the rural Alabama town of Demopolis. As the boy and his grandmother encounter some deceptively glamorous but thoroughly diabolical witches, she wisely whisks him away to a seaside resort. Regrettably, they arrive at precisely the same time that the world's Grand High Witch has gathered her fellow cronies from around the globe -- undercover -- to carry out her nefarious plans.
The Witches misses a few spells, but Anne Hathaway's game performance might be enough to bewitch fans of this Roald Dahl tale.
Canonical reviews: 186
Canonical fresh: 93
Canonical rotten: 93
Canonical calculated Tomatometer: 50%
Latest snapshot UTC: 2026-08-13 11:16:36
Snapshot Tomatometer: 50%
Snapshot review count: 186
Snapshot fresh count: 93
Snapshot rotten count: 93
Source note: Imported from manual review paste batch #2737 (full_snapshot)
| Company | Role |
|---|---|
| Double Dare You | production |
| Esperanto Filmoj | production |
| ImageMovers | production |
| Necropia Entertainment | production |
| The Jim Henson Company | production |
| Warner Bros. | production |
| Billing | Name | Character |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Anne Hathaway | Grand High Witch |
| 2 | Octavia Spencer | Grandma |
| 3 | Stanley Tucci | Mr. Stringer |
| 4 | Kristin Chenoweth | Daisy |
| 5 | Chris Rock | Older Hero Mouse |
| Batch ID | Status | Mode | Created | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1178 | processed | — | 2026-08-13 11:19:27 | Processed successfully into movie_id=1162 using update_mode=merge_non_empty. |
| Batch ID | Local Snapshot | UTC Snapshot | Entered % | Entered Count | Status | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2737 | 2026-08-13 06:16:00 (America/Panama) | 2026-08-13 11:16:36 | 50% | 186 | processed | Mode=full_snapshot. Processed 186 row(s); 0 row error(s). Parsed unique reviews in this batch=186, fresh=93, rotten=93, tomatometer=50%. Net new reviews added=186, fresh=93, rotten=93. Current canonical totals=186 reviews, 93 fresh, 93 rotten, tomatometer=50% (50.000%). Entered review count matched parsed batch count (186). Entered tomatometer matched parsed batch value (50%). |
| ID | Critic | Outlet | Fresh? | Score | RT Time Raw | Approx Published UTC | Quote |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 242952 | Eddie Harrison | film-authority.com | Fresh | 3/5 | 2025-10-28T16:59:49.000Z | 2025-10-28 16:59:49 | …Anne Hathaway does well, as does Octavia Spencer, but the comedy shrinks as the scale of the action increases, and this slick version of Roald Dahl's The Witches somehow lacks the magic of the original prose, or Quentin Blake’s beloved illustrations…. |
| 242953 | Francesca Steele | iNews.co.uk | Rotten | 2/5 | 2024-12-10T22:38:51.000Z | 2024-12-10 22:38:51 | Robert Zemeckis’s new adaptation of Roald Dahl’s story is slick and dull. |
| 242954 | Joonatan Itkonen | Region Free | Fresh | 3/5 | 2024-07-13T09:49:13.000Z | 2024-07-13 09:49:13 | It’s not a classic for all ages, and Zemeckis has undoubtedly been better, but for fans of the book and the director, there are certainly far worse options out there. |
| 242955 | LaNeysha Campbell | But Why Tho? | Fresh | 9/10 | 2023-01-16T23:12:12.000Z | 2023-01-16 23:12:12 | The Witches is a great new reimagined story based on Roald Dahl’s classic 1983 children’s book. The film has just the right amount of campy and creepy. |
| 242956 | Victoria Luxford | City AM | Fresh | 4/5 | 2022-02-26T01:18:18.000Z | 2022-02-26 01:18:18 | a wickedly funny and stylish take on a childrens classic that conjures family fun with a typically dark Roald Dahl edge. |
| 242957 | Brian Eggert | Deep Focus Review | Rotten | 1.5/4 | 2022-02-17T04:43:18.000Z | 2022-02-17 04:43:18 | Most of the movie contains some measure of digital imagery that doesnt quite look right. |
| 242958 | Alex Behan | The Post NZ | Fresh | — | 2021-11-19T21:41:06.000Z | 2021-11-19 21:41:06 | Thankfully, the new version is less scary than the original, although I personally wouldn't be showing it to anyone under 10, it's still quite scary. But also great!. |
| 242959 | Grant Watson | Fiction Machine | Fresh | 6/10 | 2021-09-14T12:10:16.000Z | 2021-09-14 12:10:16 | It is, broadly speaking, an enjoyable film. There are better films out there. |
| 242960 | Leigh Paatsch | Herald Sun (Australia) | Fresh | 3/5 | 2021-08-29T13:50:33.000Z | 2021-08-29 13:50:33 | This entertaining new version is much truer in tone to the book, where the line separating the silly and the sinister is often blurred. |
| 242961 | Chris Mello | In Review Online | Fresh | — | 2021-06-05T15:43:20.000Z | 2021-06-05 15:43:20 | There's nothing here bad enough, not even Chris Rock's atrocious narration, to weigh down the lightweight playfulness that The Witches manifests when at its best. |
| 242962 | Witney Seibold | Critically Acclaimed Podcast | Rotten | — | 2021-04-22T20:00:54.000Z | 2021-04-22 20:00:54 | I can't even tell what Zemeckis was getting at. This is not scary, not silly, not topical. Least of all entertaining. |
| 242963 | Sarah Ward | Concrete Playground | Rotten | — | 2021-03-09T08:30:23.000Z | 2021-03-09 08:30:23 | There's a lack of overall magic, either of the twisted or charming type - unless sending viewers clamouring to find wherever the original is currently streaming counts. |
| 242964 | Alex Bentley | CultureMap | Fresh | — | 2021-02-05T17:50:56.000Z | 2021-02-05 17:50:56 | Robert Zemeckis never tries to make the slight story anything more than what it is, hitting the high points from the book with the gusto they deserve. |
| 242965 | Mary Beth McAndrews | Film School Rejects | Rotten | — | 2021-01-29T20:14:11.000Z | 2021-01-29 20:14:11 | Those who were terrified by the 1990 version may be put off by a lack of practical effects and Hathaway's absolutely over-the-top performance in the 2020 film. But the new version ought to inspire and truly terrify a new generation of budding horror fans. |
| 242966 | Jennifer Heaton | Alternative Lens | Rotten | 3/10 | 2021-01-15T03:12:33.000Z | 2021-01-15 03:12:33 | This new adaptation of the Roald Dahl classic is yet another example of how a film can end up being so much less than the sum of its parts. |
| 242967 | Pete Vonder Haar | Houston Press | Rotten | 2/5 | 2021-01-14T22:12:02.000Z | 2021-01-14 22:12:02 | Hathaway gets off the easiest, vamping it up with an accent best described as "Norwegian Dracula," while Spencer is reduced to playing straight woman to a bunch of mice. |
| 242968 | Alex Hudson | Exclaim! | Rotten | 6/10 | 2020-12-30T18:21:33.000Z | 2020-12-30 18:21:33 | Audiences have understandably not taken kindly to the filmmakers' artistic licence. |
| 242969 | Trace Thurman | Horror Queers Podcast | Fresh | 3.5/5 | 2020-12-30T04:21:50.000Z | 2020-12-30 04:21:50 | Dodgy CGI aside, The Witches is a colorful, cartoonish treat for the whole family that boasts a never-been-campier Anne Hathaway as the Grand High Witch. |
| 242970 | Sarah Gopaul | Digital Journal | Fresh | — | 2020-12-29T23:21:21.000Z | 2020-12-29 23:21:21 | As the whimsy comes in different forms in this picture, it distinctly separates itself from the earlier adaptation. |
| 242971 | Anne Brodie | What She Said | Fresh | — | 2020-12-29T00:02:12.000Z | 2020-12-29 00:02:12 | Despite all, there's delight in the wonderful 60's costumes and art design and in Spencer's dignified strength and warmth. Get an early look at Bruno who could be at the start of a big career. |
| 242972 | Chris Knight | National Post | Rotten | 2.5/5 | 2020-12-28T17:30:45.000Z | 2020-12-28 17:30:45 | According to the 30-year-cycle theory of popular culture, anything in the zeitgeist of 1990 should be coming around again, right... about... now! |
| 242974 | Juan Barquin | Miami New Times | Rotten | — | 2020-12-22T16:21:07.000Z | 2020-12-22 16:21:07 | The film doesn't manage to capture any of the childish wonders that come with one of the author's most playfully scary works. |
| 242973 | Jim Slotek | Original Cin | Rotten | C | 2020-12-22T16:21:07.000Z | 2020-12-22 16:21:07 | Dahl demands some darkness and edge, but instead there's a bright Hollywood-y antic sense, and the overused and unconvincing FX only serves to further trivialize what we're seeing. |
| 242975 | Andrew Parker | The Gate | Rotten | 5/10 | 2020-12-22T16:00:43.000Z | 2020-12-22 16:00:43 | An underwhelming adaptation that looks outstanding, yet feels unnecessary. |
| 242976 | Hugo Hernández Valdivia | Cinexcepción | Fresh | 6.5/10 | 2020-12-21T19:12:13.000Z | 2020-12-21 19:12:13 | Zemeckis provides an infantilized audience with an infantilized version of The Witches that is fitting for the times. [Full Review in Spanish] |
| 242977 | Alexandra Heller-Nicholas | ABC Radio (Australia) | Fresh | 3.5/5 | 2020-12-18T03:51:00.000Z | 2020-12-18 03:51:00 | The Witches is enormous fun, bringing new life to an old story |
| 242978 | David Stratton | The Australian | Fresh | 3.5/5 | 2020-12-16T23:21:13.000Z | 2020-12-16 23:21:13 | With Stanley Tucci very amusing as the hotel manager and Spencer giving a wonderfully warm performance, the film is never less than engaging. The visual effects, some of them created in Melbourne, are excellent... |
| 242979 | Jim Schembri | jimschembri.com | Fresh | 2.5/5 | 2020-12-12T06:31:22.000Z | 2020-12-12 06:31:22 | A passable, if unremarkable remake of Roald Dahl's dark tale about a coven of holidaying witches plotting to turn the world's children into mice. Anne Hathaway can't top Anjelica Huston's performance as head witch, but shows the requisite relish. |
| 242980 | Keva York | ABC News (Australia) | Rotten | — | 2020-12-12T01:04:11.000Z | 2020-12-12 01:04:11 | This Witches tinkers with the mythology of the book to little effect. |
| 242981 | Kate Rodger | Newshub (NZ) | Rotten | 2.5/5 | 2020-12-10T22:42:36.000Z | 2020-12-10 22:42:36 | Despite the storytelling royalty, it's rather vanilla and pedestrian in the telling and doesn't rise above mostly mediocre. |
| 242982 | Jake Wilson | The Age (Australia) | Rotten | 2.5/5 | 2020-12-10T21:02:02.000Z | 2020-12-10 21:02:02 | Who could improve on the regal fury of Anjelica Huston?... Certainly not Anne Hathaway, whose performance in this remake, by comparison, has more than a tinge of the high school drama club. |
| 242983 | Filipe Freitas | Always Good Movies | Rotten | 1/5 | 2020-12-10T04:10:32.000Z | 2020-12-10 04:10:32 | This isn't a fun one to watch, and it's not even weird enough to make me like it a little. |
| 242984 | James Croot | The Post NZ | Fresh | 4/5 | 2020-12-09T17:51:47.000Z | 2020-12-09 17:51:47 | Spencer's performance is the heart and soul of this fabulous film. |
| 242985 | David Bax | Battleship Pretension | Rotten | — | 2020-12-08T00:21:09.000Z | 2020-12-08 00:21:09 | The Witches is a CGI nightmare, entirely the wrong kind of horror movie. |
| 242986 | Joseph Walsh | The Arts Desk | Fresh | 3/5 | 2020-11-26T05:11:08.000Z | 2020-11-26 05:11:08 | The magic of Dahl's material is lost, creating a generic Sunday afternoon family flick that children are unlikely to remember in the same way as the Nineties classic, and which parents are likely to doze off to. |
| 242987 | Stefan Kyriazis | Daily Express (UK) | Fresh | 3/5 | 2020-11-20T12:10:50.000Z | 2020-11-20 12:10:50 | Younger children will have a blast but older ones will probably long for the darker undertones and deeper emotional resonances present in all of Dahl's books. |
| 242988 | Heather Wixson | Daily Dead | Fresh | 4/5 | 2020-11-19T00:11:23.000Z | 2020-11-19 00:11:23 | The Witches (2020) is a wonderful new cinematic exploration of this material that will surely delight viewers of all ages. |
| 242989 | Tim Robey | Daily Telegraph (UK) | Rotten | 2/5 | 2020-11-18T14:01:12.000Z | 2020-11-18 14:01:12 | It's hard not to watch Robert Zemeckis and his cast dig back into this story without rooting for a redo that's significantly more special. |
| 242990 | Tom Beasley | VultureHound | Rotten | 2/5 | 2020-11-16T16:30:51.000Z | 2020-11-16 16:30:51 | Despite the presence of monster maestro Guillermo del Toro as co-writer, there's nothing here to chill the blood of unsuspecting kids |
| 242991 | Kimber Myers | Crooked Marquee | Rotten | C- | 2020-11-16T12:40:39.000Z | 2020-11-16 12:40:39 | The Witches leans more maudlin than macabre, with only a wild performance from [Anne] Hathaway making it remotely interesting. |
| 242992 | Sarah Cartland | Caution Spoilers | Rotten | 2.5/5 | 2020-11-13T16:30:55.000Z | 2020-11-13 16:30:55 | The peril is mild in this gorgeous but soulless remake, even though the future of all the world's children is at stake. |
| 242993 | Ruben Peralta Rigaud | Cocalecas | Fresh | — | 2020-11-09T23:00:51.000Z | 2020-11-09 23:00:51 | Although I'm of the opinion that the 1990 version is clearly superior... there are pleasant aspects that sometimes distract you from thinking too much about the movie's and its plot's quality. [Full review in Spanish] |
| 242994 | Paul McGuire Grimes | KSTP-TV (St. Paul, MN) | Fresh | 3/5 | 2020-11-06T20:42:05.000Z | 2020-11-06 20:42:05 | The Witches will be easy Halloween fair this year, but I think the original will reign supreme for my generation. |
| 242995 | Jeanmarie Tan | The New Paper (Singapore) | Rotten | 2.5/5 | 2020-11-06T20:01:56.000Z | 2020-11-06 20:01:56 | This update just lacks the whimsy and soul of its predecessor. |
| 242996 | Matt Donato | Perri Nemiroff (YouTube) | Rotten | 2.5/5 | 2020-11-05T07:50:29.000Z | 2020-11-05 07:50:29 | Hathaway goes all-in, but the film often forgets there's an entire coven and larger cinematic world beyond the actress' wild-and-crazy performance. |
| 242997 | Sergio López Aguirre | Cine Premiere | Fresh | 3.5/5 | 2020-11-05T02:40:34.000Z | 2020-11-05 02:40:34 | [I]t has humor, adventure, action, suspense, moments of terror, brave mice, and a faithful ending to the book that will confront them - perhaps for the first time - with the idea of death, both their own and that of others. [Full Review in Spanish] |
| 242998 | John Lui | The Straits Times (Singapore) | Rotten | 2/5 | 2020-11-04T20:50:47.000Z | 2020-11-04 20:50:47 | A visual tour-de-force perhaps but emotionally, about as deep as a layer of pixels on a monitor. |
| 242999 | Nicolás Ruiz | Código espagueti | Rotten | 1/10 | 2020-11-03T19:10:54.000Z | 2020-11-03 19:10:54 | The Witches is an empty and joyless spectacle; a perfectly staged and horribly realized CGI banality. Zemeckis at an all time low. [Full review in Spanish] |
| 243000 | Susan Granger | www.susangranger.com | Rotten | 5/10 | 2020-11-02T23:40:45.000Z | 2020-11-02 23:40:45 | Robert Zemeckis' creepy remake is not as bewitching as it should be. |
| 243001 | Tim Brayton | Alternate Ending | Rotten | 2/5 | 2020-11-02T19:31:21.000Z | 2020-11-02 19:31:21 | Lurches inelegantly between doe-eyed sentiment to child-friendly spookiness to comic slapstick, and all three modes are done poorly. |
| 243002 | Yasser Medina | Cinefilia | Rotten | 3/10 | 2020-10-31T23:00:11.000Z | 2020-10-31 23:00:11 | Zemeckis's film, which updates Roald Dahl's classic children's novel, seems so dull to me that I feel like I'm drinking a tasteless, magic-free potion made by witches with computer-generated mice. [Full review in Spanish] |
| 243003 | Kiko Martinez | San Antonio Current | Rotten | 2/5 | 2020-10-31T03:51:10.000Z | 2020-10-31 03:51:10 | Little kids are bound to have nightmares when the witches' mouths contort into something that looks like Pennywise from the It franchise, but it's also too silly by half for tweens who might enjoy the darker side of Halloween cinema. |
| 243004 | Ronak Kotecha | The Times of India | Fresh | 3.5/5 | 2020-10-30T23:53:34.000Z | 2020-10-30 23:53:34 | The Witches is a simple story made grandly entertaining with all its crafty ingredients firmly in place. Enough to cast its magic spell on children of all ages. |
| 243005 | Korey Coleman | Double Toasted | Rotten | — | 2020-10-30T23:03:09.000Z | 2020-10-30 23:03:09 | Not without its fun parts, and definitely not without some scary parts...but it's not the good movie that's under there with a proper rewrite. |
| 243006 | Mark Kermode | Kermode & Mayo's Film Review | Fresh | — | 2020-10-30T22:43:07.000Z | 2020-10-30 22:43:07 | It's good fun...and it has the strength of its convictions. |
| 243007 | Fausto Fernandez | Fotogramas | Fresh | 4/5 | 2020-10-30T21:52:28.000Z | 2020-10-30 21:52:28 | It wouldn't be the same without Anne Hathaway, who's got what it takes to be a great witch. [Full Review in Spanish] |
| 243008 | Andrea G. Bermejo | Cinemanía (Spain) | Fresh | 3/5 | 2020-10-30T16:20:57.000Z | 2020-10-30 16:20:57 | An entertaining family film, one of those that works miracles in a currently squalid box office, and, for that alone, deserves more forethought and respect from those of us who dedicate ourselves to writing about cinema. [Full review in Spanish] |
| 243009 | Lauren Veneziani | WBAL-TV (Baltimore) | Fresh | 4/5 | 2020-10-30T15:20:48.000Z | 2020-10-30 15:20:48 | Anne Hathaway's perfectly campy and unique performance makes this film a new Halloween staple. |
| 243010 | Alistair Harkness | Scotsman | Fresh | — | 2020-10-30T14:40:51.000Z | 2020-10-30 14:40:51 | [T]he specificity of the location switch adds an intriguing racial dimension to the story, but otherwise this is a pretty faithful adaptation, retaining the age-appropriate malevolence of Dahl's book, as well as his wonderfully unsentimental ending... |
| 243011 | Kurt Loder | Reason Online | Rotten | — | 2020-10-30T14:40:49.000Z | 2020-10-30 14:40:49 | Why has Hathaway been allowed to affect a braying Zsa-Zsa-Lugosi Hungarian accent that might have been designed to trigger tension headaches in anyone exposed to it? |
| 243012 | Anne Cohen | Refinery29 | Fresh | — | 2020-10-29T23:51:40.000Z | 2020-10-29 23:51:40 | All in all, what's most striking about The Witches is just how much fun Hathway appears to be having... |
| 243013 | Rich Cline | Shadows on the Wall | Fresh | 3/5 | 2020-10-29T22:21:18.000Z | 2020-10-29 22:21:18 | There's barely a dull moment as this hyperactive film leaps from one set-piece to the next, maintaining its happily grotesque tone. |
| 243014 | Allen Almachar | The MacGuffin | Rotten | C | 2020-10-29T21:51:13.000Z | 2020-10-29 21:51:13 | [The Witches] has a fast pace energy and is willing to dive into more thematically treacherous waters. But it buckles under a poorly defined world, a cartoonish villain, and a mind-numbingly stupid ending. |
| 243015 | Lapacazo Magrira Sandoval | New York Amsterdam News | Fresh | — | 2020-10-29T20:21:07.000Z | 2020-10-29 20:21:07 | The triumph of this new version lies in the casting. Octavia Spencer as our hero's grandmother is lovable. Hathaway's strength (and there are many more) is that she doesn't allow the visual effects to upstage her performance. |
| 243016 | Stephen Garrett | Book & Film Globe | Rotten | 2/5 | 2020-10-29T20:21:05.000Z | 2020-10-29 20:21:05 | Freakish and not in the best way, this second film adaptation of Roald Dahl's deliciously dark children's book The Witches glosses over creepy quirks for shiny shocks. |
| 243017 | Peter Sobczynski | eFilmCritic.com | Rotten | — | 2020-10-29T19:31:07.000Z | 2020-10-29 19:31:07 | The film is an occasionally competent but more often innocuous work that is long on special effects but short of the kind of charm and excitement that cannot be generated with an array of state-of-the-art computers. |
| 243018 | Carla Renata | The Curvy Film Critic | Fresh | — | 2020-10-29T19:21:07.000Z | 2020-10-29 19:21:07 | Anne Hathaway oozes elegant evil with a kitty screenplay from Black-ish creator Kenya Barris, Horror scribe Guillermo del Toro and Robert Zemeckis. Great family fun just in time for Halloween 2020. |
| 243019 | Nicola Austin | We Have a Hulk | Fresh | 3/5 | 2020-10-28T23:41:36.000Z | 2020-10-28 23:41:36 | Despite featuring quite a bit of family-friendly fun, Robert Zemeckis' 2020 reimagining doesn't fully hit the horror notes of the source material. |
| 243020 | Danny Leigh | Financial Times | Rotten | 2/5 | 2020-10-28T19:21:35.000Z | 2020-10-28 19:21:35 | All attention is soon claimed by the grand high witch, played at panto scale with non-specific Zsa Zsa accent by Anne Hathaway - a calculated centrepiece in a film frantically trying to please nine different audiences at once. |
| 243021 | Doug Walker | Channel Awesome | Rotten | 2/4 | 2020-10-28T15:50:44.000Z | 2020-10-28 15:50:44 | Pretty wowless. |
| 243022 | Edwin Arnaudin | Asheville Movies | Rotten | C- | 2020-10-28T13:00:42.000Z | 2020-10-28 13:00:42 | The bungled effects work for Hathaway's Grand High Witch makes her barely concealed, extra-wide mouth look like rejected test footage from "Venom." |
| 243023 | Sandie Angulo Chen | Common Sense Media | Fresh | 4/5 | 2020-10-28T03:50:33.000Z | 2020-10-28 03:50:33 | Campy but creepy Dahl adaptation has lots of spooky stuff. |
| 243024 | Matt Baume | The Stranger (Seattle, WA) | Rotten | — | 2020-10-27T20:01:18.000Z | 2020-10-27 20:01:18 | How very much I love the first half of this film, with its gorgeous attention to period detail and heartfelt tenderness between the characters... And then: Honk honk, fart sound. |
| 243025 | Trevor Johnston | Radio Times | Fresh | 4/5 | 2020-10-27T19:51:12.000Z | 2020-10-27 19:51:12 | [G]rown-ups should relish Stanley Tucci's witty turn as the hassled hotel manager and, while the ending stumbles slightly, this is overall a grandly entertaining affair. |
| 243026 | Leila Latif | Little White Lies | Fresh | 3/5 | 2020-10-27T18:21:11.000Z | 2020-10-27 18:21:11 | It's not all good but it is good fun. |
| 243027 | Jeffrey Edalatpour | SF Weekly | Rotten | — | 2020-10-26T22:42:14.000Z | 2020-10-26 22:42:14 | I believed that Huston's witch would rid the planet of children without a second thought. In this remake, I believed in the relationship between the Grandmother and her grandson until Zemeckis overwhelmed them with his gadgets and hi-tech wizardry. |
| 243028 | Ashlie D. Stevens | Salon.com | Fresh | — | 2020-10-26T20:41:32.000Z | 2020-10-26 20:41:32 | While Dahl's books and Zemeckis' adaptation may feel a touch too dark for some, consider that it's actually shining a light into the shadows. |
| 243029 | Allen Adams | The Maine Edge | Fresh | 2.5/5 | 2020-10-26T20:01:19.000Z | 2020-10-26 20:01:19 | The Witches is a perfectly acceptable movie...There's just not much in the way of soul here. The film ultimately feels rather empty, a lovely package without a lot inside. |
| 243030 | Matt Conway | Battle Royale With Cheese | Rotten | — | 2020-10-26T14:00:41.000Z | 2020-10-26 14:00:41 | While crafted with visual busyness, The Witches rarely re-creates the timeless magic of its source material. |
| 243031 | Jo Berry | Movies4Kids | Fresh | 3/5 | 2020-10-26T12:50:32.000Z | 2020-10-26 12:50:32 | It's Hathaway who steals the show (and makes the movie) as the Grand High Witch, bringing just the right balance of camp and menace, meanness and glamour to the part. |
| 243032 | Emma Simmonds | The List | Fresh | 3/5 | 2020-10-26T12:30:28.000Z | 2020-10-26 12:30:28 | The film does restore the book's ending - Dahl famously hated Roeg's change to that - and, if you're looking to ease your kids into horror this Halloween, then it's just about wicked enough. |
| 243033 | Tom Shone | Sunday Times (UK) | Fresh | 3/5 | 2020-10-26T05:10:51.000Z | 2020-10-26 05:10:51 | The Witches makes a sprightly companion piece to Spielberg's film, whisked along by Zemeckis's gifts of suspenseful mischief and dynamic framing... |
| 243034 | Ty Burr | Boston Globe | Fresh | 2/4 | 2020-10-26T04:50:32.000Z | 2020-10-26 04:50:32 | "The Witches" becomes scary in new and not always fruitful ways. It's rated PG, but trust me, it'll give younger kids the screaming meemees. |
| 243035 | Peter Gray | Cinefied | Rotten | — | 2020-10-25T23:30:28.000Z | 2020-10-25 23:30:28 | When mirrored to the 1990 original, it fails. As its own fantasy film, it's just not that exciting, not to mention overly explained to the point of annoyance. |
| 243036 | Lewis Knight | Daily Mirror (UK) | Rotten | 2/5 | 2020-10-25T19:30:25.000Z | 2020-10-25 19:30:25 | The Witches is a rather flat adaptation of the Roald Dahl classic of the same name, but does boast a delightfully camp performance from Anne Hathaway as the Grand High Witch. |
| 243037 | Kevin A. Ranson | MovieCrypt.com | Fresh | 3/4 | 2020-10-25T17:20:17.000Z | 2020-10-25 17:20:17 | ... never rises to meet Anne's energy in her too-few scenes, coasting on casting that fails to push the envelope further than good enough... but adequate for Halloween. |
| 243038 | Todd Jorgenson | Cinemalogue | Rotten | — | 2020-10-25T02:50:29.000Z | 2020-10-25 02:50:29 | By trying to break free from the book's pages, this remake struggles to retain its bewitching spirit. |
| 243039 | Jeffrey M. Anderson | San Francisco Examiner | Fresh | 3/4 | 2020-10-25T00:10:20.000Z | 2020-10-25 00:10:20 | If you've seen "Hocus Pocus" one too many times and "Hubie Halloween" is just a little too dumb, then Robert Zemeckis' "The Witches" - based on the classic Roald Dahl novel - offers slick, bright fun, and just on the edge of spooky. |
| 243040 | Angie Han | Mashable | Rotten | — | 2020-10-24T00:22:24.000Z | 2020-10-24 00:22:24 | Sounds like it should be fun, right? But these hijinks feel stale, without a single memorable chase sequence or CG creation in them worth admiring. |
| 243041 | Nick Johnston | Vanyaland | Rotten | — | 2020-10-24T00:12:19.000Z | 2020-10-24 00:12:19 | Zemeckis's The Witches might entice audiences with just how different is in appearance [from the 1990 version] but have them reaching for the remote by the half-hour marker. |
| 243042 | Stephen Schaefer | Boston Herald | Fresh | B- | 2020-10-24T00:12:14.000Z | 2020-10-24 00:12:14 | Hathaway looks to be having the time of her life but she tends towards camp rather than terror. |
| 243043 | Daniel M. Kimmel | North Shore Movies | Fresh | 3/5 | 2020-10-24T00:12:12.000Z | 2020-10-24 00:12:12 | The Witches is a family-friendly film that kids will enjoy and their parents will as well. |
| 243044 | Shawn Edwards | Fox 4 Kansas City | Fresh | 3/5 | 2020-10-23T23:31:49.000Z | 2020-10-23 23:31:49 | I am here for it. Spencer drops a performance she can deliver in her sleep...deliciously watchable... |
| 243045 | Sonny Bunch | The Bulwark | Fresh | 2.5/4 | 2020-10-23T20:52:09.000Z | 2020-10-23 20:52:09 | A perfectly acceptable option for families looking for some light Halloween entertainment. |
| 243046 | Brett White | Decider | Rotten | — | 2020-10-23T20:42:19.000Z | 2020-10-23 20:42:19 | This remake has a fantastic cast and is definitely spooky, but it's just a bit dull when compared to the original. |
| 243047 | Preston Barta | Denton Record-Chronicle | Rotten | 2/5 | 2020-10-23T20:42:18.000Z | 2020-10-23 20:42:18 | 'The Witches' doesn't have enough vision. It's too safe and doesn't take many risks to feel different. Everything feels artificial, even if it's not. |
| 243048 | Gabriela Meza | Fuera de Foco | Rotten | 2/5 | 2020-10-23T20:32:12.000Z | 2020-10-23 20:32:12 | If Roal Dahl could see this new adaptation of his book...he would die again |
| 243049 | Russ Simmons | KKFI-FM (Kansas City) | Fresh | 3/5 | 2020-10-23T19:52:01.000Z | 2020-10-23 19:52:01 | Hathaway's over-the-top performance is bound to creep out the kiddies in this capable if overstuffed production. |
| 243050 | Steven Prokopy | Third Coast Review | Rotten | 2/4 | 2020-10-23T19:11:50.000Z | 2020-10-23 19:11:50 | What results is a great deal of production design, lifeless chase sequences, a number of special effects, and Hathaway overacting... |
| 243051 | Peter Travers | ABC News | Fresh | — | 2020-10-23T19:01:48.000Z | 2020-10-23 19:01:48 | The British author's wickedly twisted children's book is transferred to the Deep South in the 1960s to provide a racial diversity meant to speak to a 2020 audience with a pertinent understatement that is otherwise in short supply. |
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