Curse of the Witching Tree (2015) User Reviews

Curses!

[begob · 3/10 · 21 May 2015]

Unhappy family moves into an old house while the father lies comatose in hospital. But the house is cursed by the spirit of a wronged mother.

OK, it's low budget but ... sigh. Doesn't anyone in Britain watch indie-American or French horror? Does everything have to be heritage ghostery, or Up Yours! soap opera?

The story does get its spooks on at about 40 mins, with an effective inter-cut of brother/sister/father, and the dialogue thins out as the director finally uses the camera. I won't mention what went before. Couple of badly timed jump scares - the first is literal, the second imitates a scene in Jessabelle.

It's hard on actors when they're presented with a mess, so I can't judge how good they are - except Eva the blind visionary was convincing: she had timing, and the visual of candle flames for eyes was a good touch. Actors are there to act, not overact.

Sad to be harsh, but the writing, direction and editing caused a sharp intake of breath. Use of music was just cheese - see the prologue for evidence. Pfff.

Keep it simple: ditch half the dialogue, a third of the characters, and a quarter of the runtime. Then carve out a clear story through sound and editing.

Nothing To See Here, Folks. Just Keep On Moving.

[redrobin62-321-207311 · 4/10 · 22 April 2017]

Really, there is not one original frame in this flick. Not one. You've seen everything here before and you can see what's going to happen from 10 miles away.

At the risk of giving out spoilers, I won't go into the details. Let's just say that this is a poor man's Amityville Horror or The Shining or...any countless other haunted house films made in the past 100 years or so.

The good news is I won't remember how unoriginal and uninteresting this film was 10 minutes from now. How come I didn't give the movie a 1? The cinematography wasn't too shabby; did kind of look like digital film, though which, truth be told, just does not for a film-look make. Digital video has its place in music videos and commercials, but in movies, a less-clean, slightly-muted look is preferable.

All involved tried their best with the lousy, unoriginal script they had. Could've been worse, but also could've been better.

the acting was atleast ok

[LetsReviewThat26 · 3/10 · 19 May 2022]

There were some good pieces of acting from this film. The main family were all good in there acting, in some areas atleast. Not much else to say. The house looked nice but there was just not enough scary parts, though I felt the sack masks were a little unsettling. Certain pieces of the movie go nowhere and feel unfinished. If giving a bigger budget and better script this movie could be pretty good.

Unmitigated drivel on a nonexistent budget

[Sankari_Suomi · 1/10 · 17 June 2015]

For the love of Pete, where the hell do I even start? The movie opens with two blatantly false statistics.

--'The bubonic plague, also known as the Black Death, killed an estimated 200 million people in Europe.'

No, the correct figure is 25 million. Europe's population at the time was ~65 million, so a death toll of 200 million would have wiped out the entire population of Europe about three times over.

--'There are 61,551 recorded executions for witchcraft.'

No, the total ESTIMATE of executions for witchcraft is 40,000. We don't even have records for that many, and certainly not for the utterly absurd figure of 61,551.

COTWT desperately wants to be taken seriously and tries to emulate some aspects of Hammer Horror, but it looks like it was produced by a bunch of high school kids on an overdose of Valium. The result is 103 minutes of gibberish that even Uwe Bolle would disown.

With a rambling, incoherent plot and actors who sound like they were dragged from a psych ward on 'Extra Medicine Day', this giant steaming dung ball made me want to remove my own eyes with a combine harvester.

I rate 'Curse of the Witching Tree' at 3.33 on the Haglee Scale, which works out as a humiliating 1/10 on IMDb.

Shocking - and not in a good way

[alan_hart · 1/10 · 11 June 2015]

Oh dear. I have contemplated creating an IMDb profile to be able to post reviews in the past, but this was the movie that finally compelled me to get off my a**e and put pen to paper. Not because CotWT is so irredeemably awful (although it is), but because a number of the early reviews to be posted here were so thoroughly misleading. I can only re-iterate what others have already suggested: the positive reviews can ONLY have been posted by people with a vested interest in promoting this pile of garbage. But, to an extent, they did their job - I was suckered into watching the movie, and I daresay I wasn't the only one. Hey-ho.

I'm not going to bother saying too much about the movie itself, there's no real point. The script is direction-less and largely incomprehensible. The acting is laughable - there is a reason you have never heard of any of these actors before, and you certainly won't be hearing of them in the future. The plot consists of taking just about every scary movie cliché and putting them together in a series of badly-acted, largely unrelated scenes. And the editing is absolutely laughable, probably the worst aspect of the whole sorry enterprise. I was sat watching this with my wife and daughter and, after fifteen minutes or so of us all sitting in embarrassed silence at the horror unfolding before our eyes, I turned to them and said "This is without doubt the worst movie I have ever watched". I wasn't even joking. However, this was a turning point of sorts, since from that moment onwards we were all able to relax and enjoy the movie for its unique awfulness, rather than trying to discern any sort of artistic merit in it. It actually made for quite an entertaining ninety minutes or so, as we sat there laughing as one pointless cliché followed another in this procession of over-acted, poorly scripted dross.

If I were to recommend this film on any level, it would be just that: if you are looking for a challenger for your own Worst Movie Ever Watched list, this could well be the one you have been waiting for.

Bleuch.

Wow, what a stinker

[lazylob · 1/10 · 15 August 2015]

Don't get me wrong, i'm British and i like nothing more than watching a home-grown movie. But this... I don't know where to start, the acting is like watching a school play, over exaggerated movements which are comical, the dialogue is stilted and amateur. Some members of the cast are supposed to be school children and plainly look about 25, it's insulting and unbelievable. Technically it's.... well i don't know, it's..... not technical at all. The dialogue is all captured using ambient microphones, you can barely hear the dialogue in places due to traffic, bird song or the wind. The whole thing is shot in what appears to be a lovely country house but whomever actually owns it (probably one of the producers, director or 'mate of') has obviously blown all their money purchasing or renting the property because inside the refurbishment is as poor as the acting. Who the hell would spend 3 million on a house and then put a 'Beko' fridge in it? The floor coverings, doors, door frames and skirting boards are straight out of a 90's new build house and not fitting at all with the period of the house. All in all i'd say the first 1,000 people who rated this movie are friends and family of the people who worked on it, certainly not the people who worked on it themselves because i doubt that would amount to more than 35 including the cast. What Budget? What script? What lighting? what score? What sound engineer?

It's like something produced by First year Bradford film School students, and that's an insult to Bradford Film School students as to date, they've not produced anything this appalling to my knowledge

Terrible

[toddcoury · 1/10 · 22 May 2015]

This was my second failure to bring home a good scary movie for family movie night. So much cliché, from disrespectful children, to potato sacks

Acting was terrible, story was tired, and did I mention that the acting was terrible? Was no research done to try and bolster the attempts to make any of this more believable, was he in a coma, or taking a nap?

The scariest part of this movie, was the fact that at the advertised 90 minute mark it didn't end! It went on for another 3 minutes. Very disappointed, after reading some lengthy reviews that really promoted this as a significant indie shocker. At least I had enough time to do some dishes and laundry.

Really bad: not scary at all

[elizrug · 2/10 · 16 November 2015]

This film has a decent plot but it falls apart because of all the film's other faults. We all love a good spooky tale about witches and ghosts. It's a shame the acting is so bad. It's almost painful to watch and I wasn't able to even finish the film.

I actually got to the climactic ending and turned it off. There are too many "dramatic" pauses where the camera is focused on the blank faces of the characters. There is no sense of "realness" at all--not in the dialogue, not in the actions. Obviously no one can say anything about realism in regards to how to live in a situation with hauntings like this, but there is either a lack of expression or exaggerated over-expression by the actors. The actress who plays the daughter looks older than the one who plays the mother. Characters who are petulant (and I'm not talking about the kid) with absurd lines makes this cringe-worthy. The scares are boring and trite.

Save your time, see another movie.

Dreadful.

[jackstupidjack · 1/10 · 23 May 2015]

I don't know who has written the other reviews here but I'm guessing they're connected to this heap of dross in some way. Only a mentally deficient person could possibly extract a single positive from this utter nonsense. The acting isn't even Am Dram standard, to compare it so would be unfair on the many wholehearted folks who participate in Am Dram. Wooden, spiritless and talentless. The story is beyond preposterous, the characters ludicrous, especially the moody teenage girl and 'tearaway' young lad. What I can't understand is how the directors and producers when watching rushes of this film didn't throw their hands up and admit they have made an utter howler and just bin the lot. That would have been the kind thing to do for the world at large.

Wow... Shocked!

[ddaannnnyy · 1/10 · 14 December 2015]

This is by far the worst film I have seen in many a year. The acting is more wooden than the tree in the title, the casting is shocking (The son has a posh Southern accent and the daughter a northern accent, plus the Mother must of been about 4 when she had the daughter)and even the sound is something you expect from a home movie you'd see on You've Been Framed. The camera-work is very poor too and over uses different angles and cuts away without need too may times.

Somebody should of been honest with the director at it's first screening and told him not to release this as it will bound to haunt him (more than this film haunted me anyway) in years to come if he really wants a career in film making.

Let my one good deed for 2015 be to warn everybody not to watch this.

I actually created this profile to post this review, YES... It is that bad!

Slow burn horror that demands attention

[sully_online · 8/10 · 22 May 2015]

We bought this as a Friday night pizza and beer type film designed to be cheap fun. Instead we got a surprisingly high quality chiller. The Curse of the Witching Tree is a slow burn horror that's clearly meant to suck you in.

Avoiding the standard gore fest style of things like Saw and Hostel this instead goes for a chilling, atmospheric approach more akin to The Others. There are no big budget special effects, instead you are drawn into a family in turmoil, their tension building as yours does, when they try to draw the line between the everyday horrors of life and the supernatural ones that are unwittingly unleashed.

It is a low budget film, hence the price, but it's much more than just a shlock horror. Instead you have a decent story, decent acting, decent shots – all in all a good looking film that well deserves a watch.

Highly consistent in its mediocrity.

[fedor8 · 27 April 2022]

Not a terrible movie, but quite mediocre on almost every level: mediocre acting verging on the amateur on occasion, a mediocre plot, mediocre dialog, a mediocre cast, a mediocre pace (a bit too drawn out), and a dumb ending that makes zero sense.

The one positive is the fact that natural bright colours dominate, unlike the majority of modern horror films that look grey (what I refer to as nihilistic mono-colour movies).

There's some nonsense too. The blonde's comatose husband calling out names is explained away as a "reflex reaction". Now, I'm no doctor, but even I can detect BS in that one. Even dumber is the fact that the cops consider a missing blind woman their prime suspect in a murder-and-mayhem case: that defies belief. Surely not even British cops are that stupid?

The dumb last-scene-cliche-turnaround twist makes no sense. Which ghost came back? How come this wasn't resolved after the seance?

Not a witchery film, just your typical haunted house fare.

Is it dangerous

[nogodnomasters · 7/10 · 23 February 2018]

In ancient times Isobel Redwood (Danielle Bux) is accused of killing her son and is hung as a witch. Her body is cut up into 9 pieces and buried. The tree is cursed as is the house/ pig farm of St.Jonas. Other children die there and dare others to touch the tree. A mom (Sarah Rose Denton) with two children Emma (Lucy Clarvis) and Jake (Lawrence Weller) unknowingly move into St. Jonas. Neighborhood bullies force Jake to play Ouija Board in the barn with the expected negative results.

The film starts off interesting and maintains interest in spite of the lame mother. The characters were not really developed that well. I enjoyed the ghost/witch/haunting story watching it cold without reading the back cover. (Okay I did read the back cover but quickly forgot it.) The problem with the back cover and IMDB is that the second word is a plot spoiler which ruins the twist. It is like knowing the twist in "The Other" before you watch it. If you plan on watching the film, don't read about it.

Guide: F-bomb, sex? nudity (Lucy Jane Clarvis)

Terrible

[jinxbunny · 1/10 · 10 August 2015]

This was one of the worse films I have ever watched. The acting was truly terrible. I had heard Danielle Lineker boasting about being in the film as she classes herself as an actress. Well.... a 1 minute scene and even that was awful. Pouting and trying to impress. Needs to stick to spending her husbands money. My daughter & her boyfriend also watched it with me and we laughed at how terrible all the actors were in this film. it was definitely a very low budget film, with actors who had never been heard of, and hopefully will never be seen again. The story was just so dross in all respects. I have never seen blind people with black strips of material covering their eye's. Surely could get sun glasses? And the children walking around like scarecrows with sacks covering their heads...What was all that about?

Eastenders with crap ghosts

[andrewcowley · 1/10 · 24 May 2015]

I read a couple of reviews, but I agree now with another reviewer that they MUST somehow be connected to the film! They MUST have seen another film, as this is not the film I watched! It's like a bad episode of Eastenders.

Unbelievable story line - Husband is in a coma, so wife decides buy a huge 600 year old farm to keep her pigs,(Really?) where there is a tree in the woods (By the way, the tree looked about 60 years old, if it was 600+ years old, I am sure it would have been bigger and wider. By the way, it is NOT the tree on the cover of the DVD. They couldn't even be bothered to find a decent tree, which is supposed to be central to the whole story!)

Very short "Kids around the campfire telling stories" set up to let you know that a "Wronged woman" was hanged for witchcraft, and has been killing kids ever since..

Then, usual run of the mill sequences of 'turn round and there's either no one there, or there is someone there, wide eyed, covered with blood and their tongues hanging out, with sudden loud crashing sound to try and make you jump...' Insidious did it so much better and creepier...

Very poor acting, poor clichéd supposed scary moments (I was expecting a cat to suddenly jump out and squeal ala Stephen King) it is that bad.

Dad in a coma, can presumably "see" what is going on at home, and after how many months, suddenly starts talking, saying, "Jake... House...Jake..." so the daughter calls the nurse, who tells her, "They can tend to speak quite a bit at this stage, but it's just a reaction from the nerves..." Really? Coma patients suddenly start talking, and it's a sign that they're getting WORSE!!??

I got this hoping to watch it with the family, we really tried to like it and watch it, but we turned it off after 45 minutes as it was THAT bad!

The only thing that's cursed is this 'film'

[FlashCallahan · 2/10 · 17 August 2015]

An innocent woman, accused of murdering her son and hanged as a witch, curses a tree and the children who play around it.

The effects of this act of revenge echo through the years, and restless spirits haunt the house where the bodies of the children have been buried.

A family move into their new home, and begin to uncover the terrible truth behind The Tree and the murdered children.......

Trying to deal with family problems in a horror movie predominantly is either a huge boost for a movie, or a killer blow to the narrative.

Some really work, and the most notable example of this most recently is The Babadook, because you really felt that the boy was in danger, and the mother was becoming increasingly unhinged.

Here, it's a different story. Mums hardly there, the daughter plays the predominant pillar in the families foundation, and the son who is seeing the apparitions and becoming more and more dependant on his sister.

But is this just a metaphor for how a family reacts when the 'man of the house' is in a comatose state in hospital. Is the film a subliminal narrative on impending loss, and feeling helpless when a loved one is ill.

It could well be, but when the makers of the film haven't the first idea of how to present someone in a coma, you start to lose interest........rapidly.

From my professional experience, someone in a comatose state, especially that age, should at least be attached to some monitoring equipment, and have access to some suction, oxygen, and have safety barriers attached to the bed. Here it looks like the husband is a lazy beggar.

The acting is below par, and the casting is very questionable, why on earth is the mother just four years older than her daughter in real life? They even look the same age on screen, it's pretty unbelievable stuff.

The film ends with a weird seance and a mad woman who cries blood. Whoop-De-Doo..

So all in all its a pretty disastrous effort from the writer director. It's probably feasible to say that he's based this on some life changing event, and while the metaphorical elements are pretty sound, it's the poor casting and acting that ruin the film.

Truly abysmal

[gotn-gb · 1/10 · 17 May 2022]

I quite like low-budget films, but this one is just terrible. It's like someone ordered a horror movie from Wish.

I honestly thought it was a student's project. The writing is horrendous, with fanfic level dialogue, and the acting is like they just bumped into random people on the street and asked them to be in a movie.

The music is bloody awful and sometimes louder than the dialogue - and there's one scene that's been dubbed so badly that it's like a Calgon advert.

The only shock in this whole dumpster fire was that they managed to stretch the 'plot' for 100 minutes. It could have been 30 minutes long and covered everything it had to offer.

Horrifying Disappointments

[kjcrowderkc · 1/10 · 25 May 2015]

I've seen some bad movies...really. I've seen bad movies with a good sized budget, but also good low budget movies. But this one fell way too short, and did so quickly. Nevermind the campfire opening, I didn't care much for it.

But come on, if someone told me not to believe 'what they say about isobelle' when I buy a house, I would ask a bit more than 'what' and be done.

Also, despite the overkill of turning around - peekabo or not - scenes, there were some that were just horrible. Mere gasps at times if it were real warranted a substantial scream at the very least.

And what's up with the dad? He's in a coma, but by all appearances he looks like he just could've been sleeping. Totally unconvincing. Not to mention the oh so charming nurse telling the daughter not to get her hopes up. I'd slap her she had said that to me.

Anyways, what do I know? I'm not a director. But I think this guy wasn't exactly either.

Worst movie I have seen in quite a while

[binthaider-755-822849 · 1/10 · 20 November 2016]

I'm not sure where to start. The acting, directing, producing in this is utterly rubbish. And if that wasn't bad enough whosoever chose the sound effects/music must have been a 5 year old.

The acting is really bad. It's completely cringeworthy. They have no idea how to react to things or what to do or say. At first I thought maybe it's only due to whoever wrote the script/lines but it's both! Mom being the worst of the lot.

The daughter looks the same age as the mother, when i googled them their is only 4 years between them in and this definitely shows! It just made it stupid. Then we find out the mother got pregnant at the age of 16. They have no help in the house, which is fine but somehow these 3 manage to get everything done whilst 2 go to school and college and God knows what the mother does. Mom manages to get security cameras out of no where and installs them too. It is also makes me wonder how on earth they can afford to live in a massive farm.

I had to stop watching after 60 minutes because it was just plain silly and annoying. Usually I'm the type that HAS to know the ending no matter how crap the movie ends up being but I couldn't take any more.

It is beyond shite. I can overlook one or two things but the sound, acting, story line, lack of suspense, it's all disappointing!

What?!?!?

[carlx123 · 2/10 · 21 July 2016]

I cannot work out what offended me the most, the poor sound or the diabolical colours of the screen. Oh no, I got it wrong, it was the terrible script and barrage of copyright infringements.

I have never heard so many mentions of pop culture by name or brand in a movie ever, I'm not sure whether the makers realised that you have to get permission to do this, or whether the likes of Spongebob and Harry Potter's creators paid the makers to mention them. Hmmmmm What do you think?

Witching Tree is wrong from about three minutes in, the colour grade has gone wrong, all the colours don't gel correctly. I'm sure the makers like the look, the audience however really do not.

The story is so so, but normally solid performers like Dean Maskell betrayed by the terrible sound, in his scenes the sound is so bad, you cannot even hear him.

There are good moments, like a missing kid. But what follows is bad and sad, it tries, but fails.

How does stuff like this make it to DVD, sadly i never lost too much money i picked it up in Poundland.

Shocking acting!!!

[wendyg-39369 · 1/10 · 19 May 2022]

Why does the daughter look older than the mum lol???

Hope this didn't cost much to make!! The acting is so very bad!!!

The boy actor is not the worse tho.

Also why has everyone got a different accent?!

Best film ever

[JamesCrow123 · 10/10 · 20 July 2023]

Honestly one of the best films i have ever seen!!! The budget is kind of low, but that does not cause any issues at all- you can hardly tell. The ending was such a plottwist. I never expected it, whoever wrote this is a true mastermind. Whole movie is fantastic. Well done to everyone involved, especially the cunning,handsome producer. I don't think the producer could help the budget, and i think with all these angry mean comments he'd be very sad. In my opinion, he did very well and this genius film is in my top ten, probably the top of that list. In my opinion this film beats any of Stephen Kings books and Insidious combined.

So many films that are hard to decide on watching,or not....

[InfinateANGELzPORTALz · 6/10 · 20 January 2017]

Im not saying this film is a terrible one,& should avoid.Being I enjoy Film Genres(&sub-Genres that are made,too)such as Horror,Sci- Fi,Thrillers,&even have become also a fan of FFF/Found Footage Films,etc.Although TBH/To Be Honest,it is a movie that I would honestly say is more or less,predictable-like many movies are.But I would at least recommend watching it if your in the mood to,or are merely hoping to pass the time w/a movie that isn't half-bad.Ona Sidenote-I do have to say that I've become rather frustrated that there has become a point that there are So MANY films made by various&likely"self thought"of,maybe even"self taught"as well,when it comes to"Film- Makers"w/the films released or being made.&are worse than the traditional yet tolerably watchable B-/B-Minus type of movies!Yet Altogether this is a decent film,that is decently enjoyable for its length,quality,even though it has actors I've never seen before-but IMHO+TBH,it makes for being more of the traditional B- Movie!! :)

SCARY! (acting, direction and sound, that is!)

[Pegasus7 · 1/10 · 28 August 2023]

What UTTER drivel.

The acting is like something out of a school play.

I am almost certain that some parts of the sound are dubbed over by other actors, because the voices don't look as if they are coming from the actors in real time, it looks like a bad dubbing job done after production had wrapped.

The Mother looks inexplicably about 5 years older than the daughter. It just didn't make any sense.

The plot was utter garbage, so many plot holes and unanswered questions that I won't even begin to address them here.

Do not waste your time on this complete pile of pig swill.

One of the worst horror films I have seen in a while.

Captions for the hearing impaired?

[jtlytle-1 · 1/10 · 29 November 2015]

I bought this DVD few days ago and was looking forward to watching it very much. On this DVD, CRUSE OF THE WITCHING TREE, it shows "CC" (Closed Captions) and "SDH" (Subtitles for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing) on the back cover. I am profound deaf and have been depending on captions/Subtitles. I found that this DVD, CRUSE OF THE WITCHING TREE, isn't Captions nor Subtitle. I can not return the DVD back because it was already opened. Is there a reason why it was false advertising? Is it about taking advantage from deaf people buying a worthless DVD and you collect money from it? We demand an equally accessible to all method of communications in all media, but not left behind. Thank you for listening/reading this.