Witching & Bitching (Spanish: Las brujas de Zugarramurdi; transl. 'The Witches of Zugarramurdi') is a 2013 Spanish comedy horror film directed and co-written by Álex de la Iglesia.[1] It stars Hugo Silva, Mario Casas, and Carmen Maura. It won the most awards at the 28th Goya Awards with eight wins out of ten nominations, primarily in technical categories.
Plot
The film opens with two men, José and Antonio robbing a pawn shop in Madrid. Antonio is unhappy that José has brought his son Sergio along on the heist and is even unhappier that the child is participating with them, as this puts both him and them at risk. The robbery turns sour and several people die in the resulting gunfire. The men hijack a taxi and stow its unwilling passenger in the trunk, then force the driver, Manuel, to drive towards Spain's border with the intent to flee to France.
The group is followed by Sergio's mother and José's ex Silvia as well as two police investigators Pacheco and Calvo, who are tracking Silvia. The men end up in Zugarramurdi, Navarre, where they come across a group of cannibalistic witches led by Graciana, whose mother Maritxu tries to cook Sergio in her oven. They manage to escape the witches once but are forced to turn back, and are swiftly captured by the witches.
Silvia manages to find the witches' house, enlisting the help of the cops to break into the house. José, Antonio, and Manuel end up escaping in the ensuing chaos, however Silvia and the two cops are captured, with Silvia turned into a witch with the use of tainted toad juice. The three men are captured by the witches except for José, who survives only through the intervention of Graciana's daughter Eva, who has become infatuated with him. She demands that he leave with her right away, yet José refuses to leave his son behind. With help from Eva's brother Luismi, José finds his way to the ritual chamber. Along the way they free Eva, who had been buried alive by her mother for her betrayal.
Already in the chamber, Luismi and José are witness to Antonio, Manuel, Pacheco, and Calvo slowly burning in a pyre and the emergence of Graciana's goddess, a grotesque gargantuan woman resembling a fertility statue. The goddess devours Sergio, who passes through the giant and emerges alive. José confronts the witches with the help of Eva, who manages to cause the goddess's destruction, and José manages to escape the chaos with Sergio, Eva, and the other men. One month José and Eva are shown to be a couple raising Sergio, who is growing into his powers, yet Silvia, Graciana, and Maritxu are shown to be all alive and are content to wait for the couple to grow discontent with their happiness.
Distributed by Universal Pictures International Spain,[2] the film was theatrically released in Spain on 27 September 2013, opening with €1,236,390 in its debut weekend (a 21% share of the entire box office).[3]
Reception
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On Rotten Tomatoes the film holds a rating of 84% based on 31 reviews. The site's the consensus states: "Dark, nasty, and delightfully subversive, Witching and Bitching is gross-out genre fun with a heaping helping of warped comedy for good measure".[4] On Metacritic it has a score of 73% based on reviews from 10 critics.[5]
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