The First Trailer For “The Witches” Remake (Which Will Premiere On HBO Max) Is Here

Hollywood learned years ago that they really shouldn’t fuck around with Roald Dahl film adaptations, and yes, I’m absolutely talking about that time Tom Burton put Johnny Depp in a sad Janine Melnitz from Ghostbusters II wig to play Willy Wonka. But last year we learned that a remake of the 1990 classic in all sense of the word, The Witches, was getting remade with Anne Hathaway taking over Anjelica Huston’s role as the Grand High Witch. The first trailer for The Witches dropped today, and maybe it’s the seven-months-in-isolation talking, but it’s nowhere near “Johnny Depp’s wig“-levels of bad. And in a movie where wigs are central to the plot, that’s saying something.

The very first trailer for Robert Zemeckis’ new version of The Witches was released today and it will premiere on HBO Max on October 22. Variety reports that Warner Bros. originally had The Witches scheduled to be released on October 9th, then it was pushed to October 16th. And now Warner Bros. has decided to skip the theater and just drop the whole thing on HBO Max. Of course, this is all because of the COVID-19 pandemic, which we have learned has been terrible news for box office dollars. It will be released in international theaters starting October 28th.

As for the trailer, this time around, The Witches takes place in 1960s Alabama instead of 1980s England like the original. The movie is narrated by Chris Rock, as the adult version of the main kid in the movie, whose grandma is played by Octavia Spencer. But the biggest takeaway is Anne’s Grand High Witch. Anjelica Huston’s boss witch was basically just glamorous Halston-wearing 1980s see-you-at-Studio 54 Anjelica Huston. Since you can’t improve upon perfection, Anne went a little different with her interpretation, as you’ll quickly see from the trailer.

We’ve got Anne in a Boris & Natasha accent, wearing expensive tacky clothing, acting weird and stiff and very non-human as the leader of a group of sinister ghouls, playing an evil woman who hates children. I’m sure it’s only a coincidence that HBO Max picked today to drop this trailer, but I will say that when the timing is right, it’s right.

Pic: YouTube