Please Remain Seated — The Real Horror Is the Film
There are bad movies, and then there’s The Coven — a film so aggressively dull that it could be used as a sedative in psychiatric wards. Directed by John Mackie and allegedly “based on actual events” (which must be news to reality itself), this 2015 British horror movie tries to summon ancient evil but ends up invoking only boredom and mild confusion.
The DVD cover promises witchcraft, teenage terror, and possibly Dexter Fletcher fighting Satan. What we actually get is 86 minutes of people wandering through the woods, mumbling about Lucifer, while the cameraman appears to be fighting his own personal demon — a broken tripod.
“The Devil Is the Fire Tree” — and Apparently, So Is the Script
The film opens with a flaming tree, which is ironic, because it’s the only thing in the movie that burns with any intensity. We get a goat’s head superimposed onto said tree — a clear sign of evil, or perhaps just the director testing early-2000s visual effects software.
We then cut to a classroom, where Dexter Fletcher — a genuinely talented actor who must have lost a bet — plays Mr. Shears, a teacher lecturing bored teens about witchcraft. He waves around a Latin book titled Diabolus quod igneus frutex(“The Devil is the Fire Tree”), which sounds mysterious until you realize it’s probably just a random page from Google Translate.
Before you can even ask what subject this is supposed to be, a creepy substitute teacher named Mrs. Belial (subtle, isn’t it?) interrupts the class and starts waxing poetic about missing witches. The students, naturally, take this as an invitation to go camping in the exact spot where said witches vanished — because nothing says “character motivation” like complete lack of self-preservation.
The Blair Witch with a Head Injury
Five schoolgirls — Izzy, Cara, Ruby, Fran, and Holly — venture into Queen’s Wood, a location that seems to have been chosen because it was within walking distance of the director’s house. They find the word “LUCIFER” written in ash and realize, with the subtle logic of bad screenwriting, that their names’ first letters spell out the same word.
If that sounds like a stretch, it’s because it is. Somewhere, Dan Brown is watching this movie and muttering, “Too contrived.”
The girls pitch a tent (badly), are watched by a biker (who might just be lost), and spend most of the runtime talking about things that would bore even a Ouija board. Occasionally, we cut to Mrs. Belial back home eating raw bird meat and making tinfoil figurines, which is meant to be sinister but mostly looks like a cooking show hosted by a psychotic squirrel.
The Sound of Silence (and Terrible ADR)
For a movie about witchcraft and satanic rituals, The Coven is shockingly quiet — not in a tense, atmospheric way, but in a “did someone forget to turn on the mic?” way. The dialogue sounds like it was recorded in a tin can, possibly during a séance with dial-up internet interference.
And the pacing — oh, the pacing. Watching this film feels like being trapped in a waiting room where everyone’s discussing tree bark. Scenes drag on endlessly, not because they build tension, but because no one seems to know where to cut. There’s a five-minute stretch of people walking through the woods that feels longer than most world wars.
Even the supernatural elements fail to deliver. The infamous “fire tree” keeps reappearing, but it’s so poorly rendered that it looks like the world’s worst desktop screensaver.
Dexter Fletcher: The Only Man Who Deserved Better
Let’s take a moment to address the tragedy of Dexter Fletcher’s presence here. This is the man who directed Rocketmanand finished Bohemian Rhapsody. In The Coven, he plays a history teacher who vanishes halfway through the movie, presumably after realizing he had better things to do — like dental surgery or tax audits.
Fletcher’s scenes are the film’s only saving grace, if only because he delivers his lines with the weary professionalism of someone who knows he’s in a cinematic dumpster fire but refuses to let it break his spirit.
The Teenagers from Nowhere
Our five main heroines are so blandly written that they could be replaced with potted plants and no one would notice. They enter the woods, argue about nothing, and deliver dialogue that sounds like it was copy-pasted from a forgotten after-school special.
One of them, Eve, wasn’t invited to the camping trip but decides to join later after finding a nursery rhyme about the devil that goes, “You can make him go away with a cross stick, you can make him go away with a shoe.” Which sounds less like an ancient chant and more like a lost Blue’s Clues jingle.
The movie treats this as serious foreshadowing, but it’s hard to be scared when the film’s supposed Satanic prophecy sounds like something your grandma would sing while knitting.
Mrs. Belial and the Case of the Missing Subplot
Back in her flat, Mrs. Belial (whose name might as well be “Ms. Obviously Evil”) practices dark magic with the enthusiasm of a bored preschooler at arts and crafts. She builds a model of “The Coven” out of dirt, sticks, and tinfoil figures, which is either a representation of her power or a desperate audition for The Great British Bake Off: Occult Edition.
Her purpose is unclear, her motivation nonexistent, and her acting gloriously unhinged. Watching her gnaw raw meat while whispering incantations is like witnessing a feral Gordon Ramsay summon dinner guests from Hell.
The Grand Finale: Lucifer’s Attendance Optional
Eventually, everyone in the woods dies — or maybe they don’t. It’s hard to tell because the cinematography is darker than the director’s career prospects. We see flashes of trees, someone screaming off-camera, and then—poof—another teen gets “sucked into” a flaming tree. The special effects make early Doctor Who look like Avatar.
The film ends with a nursery rhyme playing over shots of people disappearing into bark, because nothing says “horror climax” like the faint sound of nursery singing and visible pixelation. The final message seems to be: Lucifer’s greatest trick wasn’t convincing the world he didn’t exist — it was convincing John Mackie to make this movie.
Production Values: A Circle of Confusion
It’s worth noting that The Coven was reportedly filmed on location in Queen’s Wood, which was probably less a creative choice and more a matter of “we already have permission to shoot here.” The cinematography by Franz Pagot does its best, but even the prettiest tree can’t save a film where half the cast looks like they’re lost on their way to a different project.
The editing is equally cursed — jump cuts appear randomly, and transitions make it feel like the movie is skipping through time out of sheer boredom. The soundtrack by Michael Crowther tries valiantly to inject menace, but the eerie tones only emphasize how little is actually happening.
Final Verdict: The Only Spell Is Ennui
The Coven tries to summon ancient terror from the depths of British folklore but ends up raising only one thing: your blood pressure. It’s a film where absolutely nothing happens for 86 minutes, and then everything happens in 30 seconds — all of it off-screen.
There’s no real plot, no real scares, and no real reason for any of it to exist. Watching it feels less like experiencing horror and more like serving penance for unknown sins.
Still, credit where it’s due: it’s a perfect movie for insomniacs, as it practically guarantees unconsciousness before the first act ends.
Final Rating: 1.5 out of 5 burning trees.
The Coven proves that sometimes the scariest part of a horror movie is realizing you still have an hour left.
