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Araceli Nuez

Mrs. Terry

U.S. History, B3

10 May 2017

The Crucible. Dir. Nicholas Hytner. Perf. Winona Ryder, Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul Scofield .

Twentieth Century Fox films , 1996. DVD.

In the year 1692, in Salem, Massachusetts a group of white teenage girls (Winona

Ryder, as the main girl) and a slave named Tituba (Charlayne Woodard) were caught in the forest

doing witch rituals. They then have to go on trial and are pushed to admit that they are

witches and have been taken over by the devil. One of the girls is wishing for a married man

(Daniel Day-Lewis) to love her back, she meddles in his marriage as she tries to have an affair

with him. After the trials are over 20 suspects are hung as punishment. This film is a good film as

it is based on true events however it does have a few exaggerations but that's the price one pays

when adapting history into a movie. At this period of American history, the colonies were all

very very religious as it was one of the main reasons they left Britain. The film greatly represents

just how religious and different the beginnings of America were.

In the heavily Puritan colony of Massachusetts Bay, the religious views and spirituality of

the settlers very much dictated the way lived, influencing their customs and laws as seen in the

movie. The movie begins with Tituba, Abigail Williams and a group of teenage girls in the
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woods. They dance naked and Abigail drinks a chickens blood as she wishes for John Proctor to

love her back and for his wifes death. The uncle that Abigail is staying with and father of Betty,

a girl among the group, discovers them in the woods. Betty faints in the woods, causing an

increased level of suspicion by Reverend Parris (the uncle) and another couple, Thomas and Ann

Putnam as neither of their daughters will awake. As a result, the concerned parents jump to the

conclusion that the girls must be possessed by a demon and call for a renowned reverend to look

at them. In order to stay out of trouble and accusations of doing witchcraft, Abigail lies and says

Tituba (the slave) is a witch. Tituba has no say in the unfolding events as it is 1692 and she is a

slave. Tituba is punished with whippings but escapes execution as she confesses that she is a

witch. Abigail, a quite manipulative teenage girl, takes this as an opportunity to accuse other

women, namely John Proctors wife, Elizabeth as women involved in evil rituals and who she

saw with the devil. The girls are then formally accused in court and John asks Mary Warren to

testify against the girls and say the witchcraft was faked. The judges decide to arrest all the

accused and then question them. As the trials continue, Mary claims she only thought she saw

spirits and the other girls pressure into again saying that she did see spirits, taking her back to

square one. Elizabeth and the other girls are charged but Elizabeth is spared from death as she

announces that she is pregnant.

If the beginning of the trials were not enough drama for you, John Proctor reveals that he

and Abigail had an affair to prove how uninnocent she is. He correctly claims Abigail framed

Elizabeth in order for them (Abigail and John) to be able to get married. Again, to save herself
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from punishment Abigail lies and denies the affair so then Mrs. Proctor is called in to affirm if

the affair really happened. Cheater is a very negative label today and an even bigger deal in the

Puritans pure ways of life, so Elizabeth lies to protect Johns reputation (and of course, she

was unaware of him having confessed). One of the many reverends, Reverend Hale tries to help

John and persuade the judges that he did have an affair with Abigail, but the girls are

mischievous and create a commotion around Mary supposedly attacking them as a bird which

turns the court against John even more as he asked her to testify before. Rev. Hale doubted

Abigails claims. To protect herself from death by a hanging, Mary lies and accuses John of

being a witch! John is arrested as he says God is dead, when asked if he will return to God.

Thrice Abigail lies and attempts to accuse Rev. Hales as a witch but because he is a minister and

she is his wife, she is pure and can not possibly be a witch. Sometime later, as the drama is about

to settle down, Abigail the troublemaker steals money from her uncle to flee the colony. She

ventures a move on John once more, asking him to leave with her but he refuses. On the day of

his hanging, John is pushed to sign a confession and have others confess after him but instead

rips the confession apart before being hanged along with the other accused.

In retrospect, the film was artistically wonderful. It kept the audience on their toes,

jumping at every accusation. While there a few minor inaccuracies and things left out, such as

Abigail never having been a maidservant for the Proctors, the gist of the movie was spot on. The

movie can be used to analyze the extent of the influence of religion in everyday early American

colonial life. It can be used to compare how sexually open women were to now, how accepted
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and spoken of sexuality was and even the difference in womens roles. Overall, the film deserves

a solid 8. An 8, because although it was a wonderful film, parts of it were rather open-ended and

did miss a few facts. I would highly recommend the movie to anyone looking to explore religion,

witchcraft, law and social change in early America.

Works Cited

"The Crucible (1996)." IMDb. IMDb.com, n.d. Web. 9 May 2017.

The Crucible. Dir. Nicholas Hytner. Perf. Winona Ryder, Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul

Scofield . Twentieth Century Fox films , 1996. DVD.