When Lifetime Met Lovecraft (and Ran Screaming)
“The forest sees all,” says one of the many overly serious characters in The Watcher in the Woods, a 2017 TV remake directed by none other than Melissa Joan Hart. Yes—Sabrina the Teenage Witch herself tried to conjure horror and instead summoned… whatever this is. Starring the ever-regal Anjelica Huston, this film promises gothic chills and otherworldly dread, but what it delivers feels more like Goosebumps if it had been shot in a fog machine sale aisle.
It’s based on Florence Engel Randall’s eerie 1976 novel and the 1980 Disney adaptation that terrified a generation of kids. But this remake? It’s not so much terrifying as it is a gentle reminder that sometimes nostalgia is best left buried—preferably under the same haunted tree that swallowed the plot.
The Story: Lost Girls, Lost Souls, and Lost Audiences
The setup is simple enough: an American family moves to the Welsh countryside because dad’s doing research. (Research in what, you ask? It doesn’t matter. Probably “science.”) The Carstairs clan rents Aylwood Manor, a gloomy old house run by Mrs. Aylwood, played by Anjelica Huston, who gives off the exact energy of a woman who deeply regrets signing this contract but plans to cash the check anyway.
Soon, strange things happen. Mirrors shatter dramatically. Dolls get creepy names. And people whisper ominous exposition like they’re auditioning for a haunted audiobook. The eldest daughter Jan (Tallulah Evans) starts seeing a ghostly girl in reflections, while her younger sister Ellie begins channeling spirits via bedtime shrieking fits. Meanwhile, local villagers share ominous warnings with all the urgency of people discussing the weather.
Turns out there’s a “Watcher” in the woods—a supernatural doctor from the Black Plague era who, for reasons that remain as murky as the cinematography, wants someone to “peal” the church bells so his soul can finally rest. What does “pealing” have to do with interdimensional kidnapping? No idea. But Lifetime’s CGI budget wasn’t about to clear that up for us.
Melissa Joan Hart’s Forest of Confusion
Melissa Joan Hart deserves credit for trying. Directing horror is tough, and she clearly wanted to blend gothic mystery with family-friendly frights. Unfortunately, what she created feels like The Haunting of Hill House directed by a PTA committee. Every potential scare is undercut by melodramatic dialogue and lighting choices that scream “Daytime Soap But Make It Spooky.”
The film is tonally lost—too tame for true horror, too humorless for camp, and too slow for suspense. It’s like it can’t decide whether to frighten us or tuck us in with a warm cup of “mild unease.” Even the haunted forest seems bored, sighing through the fog like, “Can we get this séance over with already?”
To be fair, the original Disney version also struggled with coherence. But that film had charm—and genuine atmosphere. This one feels sanitized, the cinematic equivalent of a ghost story told during a company retreat.
Anjelica Huston: National Treasure, Trapped in a Lifetime Movie
Watching Anjelica Huston in this movie is like watching a Ferrari stuck in rush-hour traffic. She’s regal, magnetic, and gives every line the gravitas of a Shakespearean soliloquy—even when that line is, “The forest remembers.” You half-expect her to sprout bat wings and start her own, better movie off-screen.
As Mrs. Aylwood, the grief-stricken matriarch who lost her daughter to the mysterious Watcher decades ago, Huston is the only one who sells the tragedy. Unfortunately, she’s also the only one acting like she’s in a horror film. Everyone else seems to think they’re in a vaguely spooky tourism commercial for rural Wales.
Huston’s face carries centuries of sorrow; the script gives her maybe two minutes of backstory and some light root-wrangling before she’s sidelined. It’s like hiring Gordon Ramsay to make toast.
The Supporting Cast: Ghosts of Direction Lost
The rest of the cast ranges from adequate to aggressively bland. Tallulah Evans as Jan plays “angsty teen” with all the enthusiasm of someone reading a grocery list in a haunted supermarket. Nicholas Galitzine as Mark, the local boy who helps her unravel the mystery, mostly looks confused—possibly about the plot.
Dixie Egerickx as Ellie, the possessed little sister, delivers her trance scenes with commendable commitment, though her main job seems to be yelling “NERAK!” (That’s “KAREN” backward, by the way. Subtlety is not invited to this séance.)
The parents, meanwhile, are so oblivious that it borders on performance art. Their daughter screams Latin in the dead of night, and they respond with the energy of, “Ah, she’s probably just homesick.”
The Forest: Less “Watcher,” More “Wanderer”
The titular Watcher is supposed to be the movie’s big bad—a spectral doctor cursed by medieval superstition. But when he finally shows up, he looks like someone glued a glow stick to a pile of laundry.
His backstory—tragic plague healer wronged by his village—is actually fascinating on paper. But the movie never builds on it. Instead, it throws him in at the last minute, demands we care, and then resolves everything with the power of church bells. I’ve seen scarier bell-ringing in Quasimodo karaoke night.
When the mystery unravels, it’s less “mind-blowing twist” and more “Did we just run out of film?”
Production Values: The True Horror
The scariest thing about The Watcher in the Woods is the budget. The special effects look like they were rendered on a 2004 laptop. Mirrors crack in perfect CGI symmetry. “Other dimensions” are represented by a smoke machine and someone waving a blue light filter. And the “forest” looks suspiciously like the same three trees filmed from different angles.
The cinematography oscillates between “daytime drama” and “student film.” Every scene is lit like the director was afraid of actual darkness. The woods—meant to be mysterious and menacing—are instead so overexposed they look like a summer picnic spot. If this is what the afterlife looks like, then eternity is just waiting for better color grading.
Lifetime’s Idea of Horror
Let’s be honest: Lifetime’s brand of horror is like decaf coffee—technically the same category, but missing the point entirely. They want tension without terror, ghosts without gore, and a story you can watch with your mom without spilling her Chardonnay.
The problem is that The Watcher in the Woods tries to ride that line and ends up tripping over it repeatedly. It’s not scary enough for horror fans and not dramatic enough for Lifetime regulars. It’s the cinematic equivalent of lukewarm soup—unoffensive, vaguely comforting, and entirely forgettable.
The Ending: Ding Dong, the Plot’s Gone
The climax sees Jan recreating a decades-old prank to summon the Watcher, who promptly yanks her into another dimension. (It’s as exciting as it sounds.) Then, in what can only be described as divine comedic timing, the heroes realize the Watcher didn’t want a “peeling” (as in skin removal) but a “pealing” (as in bell ringing). Because, you know, accents.
So Mark runs to the church and rings the bell like a man possessed by the spirit of lazy screenwriting. The Watcher is instantly appeased, the lost girl returns unharmed, and everyone hugs while the credits roll over what sounds like rejected Twilight soundtrack music.
It’s the kind of ending that makes you wonder if the Watcher wasn’t haunting the forest at all—but the editing bay.
Final Verdict: A Horror Film in Name Only
The Watcher in the Woods (2017) isn’t a total disaster—it’s a gentle misfire, like a séance where the ghost just sighs and leaves. It has good intentions, a stellar actress in Huston, and a genuinely creepy concept. But it’s undone by lifeless direction, bargain-bin effects, and the pacing of a sedated snail.
It’s not terrifying, it’s not thrilling, and it’s barely watchable. But it is funny—just not on purpose.
In the end, the only real horror here is realizing you could’ve spent those 87 minutes watching Hocus Pocus instead. At least that has Anjelica Huston’s spiritual sister, Bette Midler—and better lighting.
