How accurate is the language they speak in The Witch (2015)?
In The Witch (2015), the script is written with Shakespearean construction (lots of thou's, and thee's and hast's), the actors were told to speak in a heavy Yorkshire accent, and a lot of the vocabulary is archaic (as well as some chunks were apparently 1:1 accurate as to what would be said at the time).
It takes place in early colonial 17th Century, circa 1630s.
What language would they speak in reality? How accurate is The Witch?
Best Answer
I saw this movie when it came out and went to a screening with the director, and a question was asked about the dialogue. It is not authentic, it's based on present day Yorkshire accents. They tried very hard to make everything in the film as authentic as possible for the location and the period, but he explained that the decision was made not to attempt to reproduce how colonial English might have sounded (which is nothing like present day English or American dialects--English dialects hadn't become non-rhotic yet) because it would've made the film nearly incomprehensible to audiences. He gave the example of how the word "knife" would've sounded, with the k still being pronounced at that time, ending up something like "ka-noifey", so you can see how struggling to decipher the language might have distracted from the substance of the film.
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What accent do they have in The Witch?
One reason mainstream audiences may be having trouble really loving The Witch is that the characters speak in thick English accents, using archaic syntax. They are, relatively speaking, fresh off the boat. It shows in the way their thoughts turn back to previous days.Is The Witch in English?
The Witch (stylized as The VVitch, and subtitled A New-England Folktale) is a 2015 period supernatural horror film written and directed by Robert Eggers in his feature directorial debut....The Witch (2015 film)The WitchCountriesUnited States CanadaLanguageEarly Modern EnglishBudget$4 millionBox office$40.4 million12 more rowsIs The Witch based on a true story?
The Verdict As the ending title screen states, The Witch is not based on a true story. What that means is that there was no one named William who took his family into the woods only to be killed one-by-one by the devil and his servants.What does Black Phillip say at the end of The Witch?
The Witch's \u201cWouldst thou like to live deliciously\u201d quote had some horror fans confused. The things Black Phillip offers \u2013 namely butter and pretty dresses \u2013 are pleasures so simple they don't seem a worthy enough trade for the previously devout Thomasin's soul.Robert Eggers on 'The Witch', Familial Trauma, and the Supernatural
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