The Wretched is what you’d get if Disturbia, The Witch, and a Grimm fairytale were all tossed into a woodchipper, then reassembled by two brothers who grew up on VHS horror and bad decisions in the woods. And I mean that as a compliment.
Made for about the cost of a mid-range SUV and a Starbucks gift card, this scrappy 2019 supernatural horror film from the Pierce Brothers absolutely should not be as effective as it is. Yet somehow, on a $66k budget, they pulled off one of the most fun, nasty, and surprisingly imaginative witch movies in recent memory—and even accidentally became a box-office “hit” thanks to the pandemic and a drive-in theater revival. The witch is powerful, but not as powerful as limited competition.
Small Town, Big Problem, Ancient Tree Demon
Our protagonist is Ben Shaw (John-Paul Howard), a sullen teen with a broken arm, divorced parents, and the kind of energy that says, “I totally listen to sad playlists and pretend not to care.” He’s shipped off to stay with his dad, Liam, in a lakeside town, and gets a summer job at the marina. Classic setup: moody kid, small town, simmering family drama. All that’s missing is a malevolent forest witch that eats children and rewrites reality.
Oh look, there she is.
Next door live Abbie, Ty, and their young son Dillon, your standard “aspiring catalog family” until they hit a deer, drag it home, and accidentally bring with it a parasitic creature that crawls out of the carcass and into their lives. If your first mistake is hitting a buck, the second is dragging that corpse home instead of leaving it for nature like a normal person.
The witch here—called “The Wretch” in the credits—isn’t your pointy-hat, broomstick type. She’s an ancient, body-hopping, child-hunting tree witch with a taste for bones and the extremely specific power of making people forget their children ever existed. Which is such a savage power move. Ghosts slam doors. Demons possess you. This thing erases your kids from your memory and then nests in your skin. That’s not just evil; that’s emotionally efficient.
Ben vs. The Neighbor from Hell
The movie wisely starts small. Ben thinks something weird is up with the neighbors:
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He sees Abbie acting strangely in the woods.
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Dillon suddenly “doesn’t exist” according to his own father.
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Abbie goes from “Pinterest mom” to “corpse in a shower” in record time.
Of course, whenever Ben tries to tell anyone what he’s seeing, adults either don’t believe him or are too busy making questionable romantic choices. His dad is distracted by his new girlfriend Sara, the cops are useless, and his boss’s daughter Mallory mostly knows him as “the guy who screws up boat jobs and blushes a lot.”
It’s a classic teen-horror setup: only the kid sees what’s really happening, and only the kid has the stubborn lack of self-preservation necessary to do something about it.
What makes it work is that Ben isn’t a perfect Final Boy. He’s kind of a jerk at times—jealous, impulsive, and not above blowing off Mallory in the worst possible way. But that gives him room to grow, and it also keeps the witch from being the only monster in the movie. Humans aren’t doing great either.
The Witch: Practical, Gross, and Gloriously Mean
Let’s talk about the real star: the witch.
The creature design is an absolute highlight. The Wretch feels like she crawled out of some old-world pagan folk tale: part root, part corpse, part mangey animal. We see her:
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Emerging from animal carcasses
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Contorting inside human bodies
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Stalking the woods with unsettling, insect-like movements
The filmmakers lean heavily into practical effects, and it pays off big time. There’s weight and texture to the witch—oozing, cracking, tearing—that CGI often can’t replicate. It’s not polished; it’s tactile and nasty in exactly the right way. You can practically smell the damp dirt and rot.
Beyond the visuals, her mechanics are fantastic. She:
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Targets families with children
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Possesses a parent
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Steals the kids
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Then slowly erases the very memory of them
So you’re left with a grieving teenager insisting, “You have a son!” to a man who responds with, “Buddy, I barely remember my Wi-Fi password, much less a whole child, calm down.” It’s a brilliantly cruel twist on the “nobody believes me” trope: they literally can’t.
And the movie doesn’t cheat this power. When we reach the reveal that even Ben has forgotten his little brother Nathan, it’s a legit gut-punch. The witch isn’t just attacking bodies; she’s attacking relationships. That’s unusually sophisticated cruelty for a movie that also features deer guts and boat pranks.
Scares on a Budget
You can feel the budget limitations in The Wretched—but mostly in ways that make you weirdly admire it more.
There are no elaborate CGI set pieces, no massive crowds, no overstuffed mythology monologues. Instead, the Pierce Brothers deploy:
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Creepy sound design – whispers, cracking wood, distant movement
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Clever blocking – shadows in door frames, shapes in the background
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Practical makeup & creature suits – always more effective than cartoonish CG slop
The scares build using rhythm and repetition: weird noises at night, something off in a neighbor’s behavior, glimpses of unnatural movement. Then, when the movie does decide to go for throat—like the scene of Abbie in the shower, or the tree lair sequence—it feels earned.
And the tree lair is great: a gnarled interior nightmare of roots and bodies where the witch stashes her snacks. It’s like walking into a rotten tooth.
Teen Drama, But Make It Witchy
There’s a surprisingly charming teen-summer subplot woven through the carnage. Ben’s interactions with Mallory and the local rich kids give the story a nice Amblin with trauma vibe:
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Awkward flirting at the marina
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Parties by the water
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Bullies with boats and no emotional complexity
Mallory is a particular standout: she’s sarcastic, grounded, and more competent than pretty much any adult in town. Which makes it extra tense when the film reveals that the witch may be targeting her little sister Lily next.
And then there’s the ending, which has a mean little stinger worthy of a 1980s paperback horror novel. Ben and Mallory, having survived the ordeal, share a sweet goodbye. She tucks a flower into his hair before heading off to take kids sailing.
He waves, looks at the flower… and realizes it’s fake.
In this movie, fake flowers = guaranteed witch activity. It’s such a simple but chilling signal: the witch isn’t dead. She’s wearing Mallory now. And Mallory is alone on a boat with three children.
Roll credits. Sleep tight.
Why This Little Witch Movie Works So Well
The Wretched doesn’t reinvent the horror wheel. It just spins that thing with enthusiasm and some nicely sharpened spikes. It works because:
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It takes its monster seriously, even when the tone is playful.
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It uses its mythology in clever, emotionally-oriented ways (the forgetting) rather than as wiki filler.
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It’s not afraid to be mean—kids die, families are shattered, and the ending is only “happy” if you turn it off 15 seconds early.
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The performances are solid across the board, especially John-Paul Howard and Piper Curda.
And on top of it all, there’s something deeply satisfying about a $66,000 witch movie outlasting blockbusters in the pandemic-era box office. While giant studio films delayed release, this little evil tree hag rolled up to the drive-in and said, “I got you.”
Final Verdict: The Witch Next Door Deserves Your Attention
If you like your horror with:
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Creepy folklore vibes
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Messy family drama
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Teen awkwardness
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Gross practical creature work
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And a final shot that makes you mutter, “Oh, that’s rude”
…then The Wretched is absolutely worth your time.
Just, uh, if you ever notice a weird symbol carved into a tree, mysterious kids going missing, and your neighbors suddenly insisting they never had children?
Maybe don’t drag the dead deer into your yard. And definitely don’t trust the flowers. 🌸
