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