HFC @ Fantastic Fest ‘24: Witte Wieven

A fanatical community of misogynistic Dutch people, or powerful, skittery, and kind of sexy forest demons? Oh, what a decision for down-on-her luck villager Frieda (Anneke Sluiters, Flikken Rotterdam) to make in Didier Konings’ Witte Wieven.

Making his feature film directorial debut, Konings, who cut his teeth as a concept artist for blockbuster films like Thor: Love and Thunder and Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, keeps things short in Witte Wieven — literally. The film is only an hour. In such a compact timeframe, Konings, along with writer Marc S. Nollkaemper (making his feature-length debut too), struggle to bring anything new to their tale of religion, misogyny, and independence. Frieda’s life is established as one of constant sorrow: she cannot bring a child into her world and as a result, she faces the ire of her village and her husband Hikko (Len Leo Vincent). In addition to constantly being called “The Barren One” by the whole village including its religious leader, Frieda is also at the mercy of a story that is desperately trying to get emotional heft out of its themes. 

To her credit, Sluieter attempts to bring some meat to a character condemned to a life of mostly silence and prayer. Through her searching and sorrowful eyes, the actor showcases a deeper pain trapped within her character’s body — giving more emotional insight than the script offers. Konings and Nollkaemper never dig deeper than how the town labels her, and through that, the film itself holds a cold view of its central character. Even Frieda’s lifeline in the form of the local demons she comes across in the nearby forest feels lifeless. Their pivot in the third act into Frieda’s rescuers comes out of nowhere, lacking any build up. The intent of this switch aims to bring Frieda the freedom she craves, but the fact that the film ends as soon as this happens feels like a writer’s hasty wrap up on the story rather than an engrossing or earned narrative conclusion.

With just an hour to get things settled, these creatures lack the terror or redemption that the story aims to imbue them with. Konings, utilizing his background as a visual ideas guy, brings some interesting sights onto the screen, especially in the case of the forest demons, who move with the grace of Cara Delevingne in Suicide Squad while adorned with branches and shrubbery. Their design, along with some of their violent acts–like turning a person’s body being turned into a living tree–showcase Konings’ visual flair However, these monsters leave a lot to be desired in regards to how they fit into the story and Frieda’s arc. The jump scares these skittery beings take part in are tame. Editor Kees Riphagen cuts these scenes to create a generic flow of building dramatic music, followed by a quick cut to a shadowy visual of a demon screaming at the camera. It’s a method for drawing scares found in many lower-end Blumhouse productions. As a result, there’s a lacking oomph to these moments, almost as if Konings is scared to add true horror to his movie.

The entirety of the film seems to be pulled out too soon from the oven of imagination. There are well-realized settings and characters with initially interesting situations, but each lacks deeper elaboration, which lets down the themes it brings to the table. Konings and Nollkaemper aren’t subtle in their depiction of being a woman in a medieval religious community. Nor are they subtle in the terrors and violence, both verbal and physical, that men in these communities bring to their women. Where Sluiters thrives in finding the slim inner emotions of her character, every other cast member drowns in their one-note roles. The devout religious leader is a fanatic and nothing more. The husband never listens to his wife and only views her as a baby factory. In essence, all the men are misogynistic zealots. The women? Well, outside of Frieda, there aren't really many other women doing anything interesting in this movie. In Witte Wieven, the characters and messages are about as obvious as they can get.

Not being subtle isn’t always a bad thing. However, when a film casts its characters and themes in such obvious colors with little to no emotion operating behind it, there’s not much there for an audience to grapple with. Unlike Frieda, Witte Wieven fails to find salvation in the forest; in its place, it only comes across an undercooked film.