Spoiler Warning: You Won’t Be Alone (2022)
Be it a green, bony, pointy-hat wearing sorceress, flanked on all sides by a flock of hooting aerial apes, an initially kind old woman living a solitary existence in a house that would make Willy Wonka blush and an appetite for chubby children, a bookish, curly-haired sorceress who befriends The Boy Who Lived, or even a vermillion-clad vixen that ranks among the strongest Avengers,witches have long been a staple of popular culture. Their serums and spells have been most prevalent in the horror genre.
2022’sYou Won’t Be Alone, a recent addition to the lineage of witches on the big screen,subverts the usual trappings of witchdomin cinema by giving us the enchantress protagonist Nevena (Sara Klimoska) and a satanic villainess, Old Maid Maria (Anamaria Marinca), whose violence stems from unspeakable abuse. Despite being set in pre-industrial Macedonia,You Won’t Be Aloneforces modern audiences to grapple with familiar themes. Amidst the ebbs and flows of contemporary gender politics, one cannot help but see the witch as a product of her patriarchal surroundings. Is gaslighting, if one can excuse the pun, is the new witch burning?
The Scars of Time
It wouldn’t be a witching tale without a good ol' fashioned burning at the stake, and 2022’sYou Won’t Be Alone,though largely an exercise in challenging the form, does not buck this particular trend. After spending time as the captive, where she was forced to attempt and bear the child of a dying man, our villain, Maria, is scratched by a witch and subsequently undergoes a transformation.
Maria, however, does not transform into the Deadpool-looking, blood-colored monster audiences have watched throughout the film. Rather, when her satanic secret is discovered, it is her own townsfolk that set her ablaze, and though she survives the attempt on her life, the damage is permanent. One can easily see the modern-day equivalencies; standards of beauty are subjective, and our youth-centric society has unfairly deemed folks of a certain age aesthetically undesirable.
Age-Old Gender Roles
Since its inception, the horror genre has had a complex relationship with the fairer sex. At times, women have been little more than meat puppets, to be ogled and objectified for their beauty before meeting their untimely doom at the hands of an ax or a cleaver. However, more and more horror films buck this trend, replacing hysterical damselswith strong, capable female leads.You Won’t Be Alonehas cemented itself among the best feminist horror films. Our witch protagonist, Nevena, as she attempts to assimilate into society, inhabits the bodies of both men and women and, in both scenarios, is forced to field a disparate set of issues. Audiences see Nevena as a submissive plaything for the village men, only to turn the tables with the help of her witch claws.
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In 2022, stories that shed light upon the unique challenges of womanhood are more important than ever, as evidenced by therelease of director Ti West’sX, a sultry examination of age and beauty, and the upcoming Alex Garland pictureMenandYou Won’t Be Alonesheds a new and important lighton timeless gender struggles.
The Perils of Parenthood
From the release ofYou Won’t Be Alone’sgripping trailer, it has been clear that audiences would see the already terrifying task of child-rearing subjected to a cadre of demented distortions. At the film’s conclusion, Nevena’s witch stepmother, already the cause of immense strife, attempts to murder her newborn child. In response, Nevena scratches the chest of her daughter and spits blood on the wound. Audiences have previously learned this action turns humans into witches, although it saves the child’s life. Maria is shocked, unable to comprehend how her “adopted” daughter Nevana was so willing to subject her daughter to life as a permanent outsider, a witch.
Love, asYou Won’t Be Aloneaudiences are meant to understand, means sometimes making difficult choices. Nevena’s original mother allowed her only child to go feral in a cave to avoid the snares of Maria, and Nevena is forced to confine her own daughter to a lifetime of alienation. It’s unclear if either action had a positive effect long-term, but love is about making hard decisions and dealing with the consequences.
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You Won’t Be Aloneis rife with themes that any socially conscious viewer can extrapolate upon to examine their own experience. We all struggle with societal beauty standards. If someone thinks that they live a life free from gender conflict, that particular someone is probably deeply reviled by their female coworkers. In a world where fascists are coming back, it’s scarier than ever to imagine raising a child. 2022’sYou Won’t Be Alonetackles all those issues and more. For that reason, it can already be considered a timeless tale.
