We're going to need some more holy water.

Season of the Witch

(2011)

Enjoyably trashy Nicolas Cage 13th century tale of devilry, with Cage and Ron Perlman as disillusioned knights tasked with escorting a suspected witch (accused of blighting the land with plague) to a distant monastery to stand trial. A lively supporting cast includes Stephen Graham, Robert Sheehan and a revoltingly plague-ridden Christopher Lee.

Cage and Perlman make no attempt to disguise their accents and are given the most anachronistic dialogue possible, but the film has a cheerful disinterest in anything approaching historicity across the board.

Dominic Sena previously worked with Cage on Gone in Sixty Seconds. He puts together some effective sequences (a ramshackle bridge crossing in particular) and creates a suitably scabby atmosphere. But it looks like the money ran out at along the way as there's some fairly rank CGI throughout, the use of which unfortunately becomes more liberal as the film edges towards its climax. Best line; "We're going to need some more holy water."

***

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Prepare the Heathen’s Stand! By order of purification!

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Vampire Academy (2014)
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Venom (2018)
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Tomb Raider (2018)
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Phantom Thread (2017)
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