I do not think any show got Real Magic 100% accurate, so take each show with a grain of salt. Practical Magic and The Craft are the most accurate you will get, but it includes people flying and bringing people back to life. How they act about witchcraft, how they perform most rituals and spells, those are far more accurate than, say, Hocus Pocus.
what i see it like, most movies have its magic in some way or another. But to understand witchcraft it is not required to watch any movie. One can start by reading different books and articles over the internet and joining covens might help you to understand why magic word is used here on this website.
Re: Movie/show got it right By: Nekoshema / Novice
Post # 4 Oct 02, 2020
Practical Magic. Love that one. It's not perfect, but how the family acts, closet thing we've got to a movie with a Pagan family.
The Craft is another good one. [I credit the fact they got a Wiccan Priestess to advise on the shoot as well as two of the main cast actually being witches]
I've never seen The Witches of Eastwick, but people give that a thumbs up.
The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina rubs me the wrong way. It's meant to be Satanic and scary and not real, but its use of real-life elements, that upsets me. They used Baphomet which got them sued by The Satanic Temple because they were using the symbol in a negative light. They made a woman empowerment group they called "wicca", they performed a handfasting in which they bound the couple's hands together "with the skin of a newborn", and the last season they had "evil Pagans" killing people in the hopes of resurrecting their god "The Green Man." All these things lead me to believe they did their research and chose to ignore it [I also listen to an interview on The Witch Wave where she interviewed one of the writers who practices witchcraft, so I know they have people who know what they're talking about]
The Ancient Magus Bride is the closest thing to "real witchcraft" I have seen. It's an anime set in rural England where a Japanese girl who is a Sleigh Beggy is trained to be a mage by a man with a skull for a head. They interact with various mythological creatures and celebrate Yule, and while there are fantastical elements, it really shows how much research the author went into to make it accurate to real magick and European folklore. Highly recommend it [it's also visually stunning and the soundtrack is amazing]
Re: Movie/show got it right By: Lark Moderator / Adept
Post # 5 Oct 02, 2020
The movie " The Craft" is absolute nonsense and bears no resemblance to either Witchcraft or Wicca.
" Practical Magic " is largely fantasy but it does get one thing right and that is to point out that our actions have consequences and it is our responsibility to clean up any messes that we have made.
I have seen nothing on TV that portrays Wicca or Witchcraft in a realistic fashion.
The cartoon "Wyrd Sisters" based on a novel of the same name by Terry Prachett does teach some lovely lessons about magic.
Not to argue your point, but The Craft does bear some resemblance to Wicca and Witchcraft. The rituals such as their dedication in the field and the casting on the beach are realistic. The whole lightning and powers are not, but calling on the watchtowers and entering the circle with perfect love and perfect trust are accurate. The glamour's portrayed are nonsense, but using an enemies hair to curse her, or being told the the threefold-law, again, are true things in witchcraft. They embellishing on it, sure, but there are small hints of reality. If this was what someone used to learn witchcraft, I would agree, but as escapist entertainment for someone who knows a few basic things about the craft, it is not that bad.
In the end, movies don't follow reality because most often, reality is boring. Cinema is about telling a fanciful story to engage and entertain. Some do work harder than others to provide the idea of authenticity but the purpose is less to honor the source and more to provide suspension of disbelief. When creating a fantastic world, it still needs rules to follow. If it doesn't then the audience notices because cause doesn't create the expected effect. Rules are easy to build off what is already familiar and then tweaking them a bit.
Folklore, legends and stories, things that are in the collective conscious are easy to use because they need little explanation, which is important when a story has a time limit.
Personally I have fun with just about any story, for the story's sake. Though I do also enjoy retro-actively picking through what is presented to recognize what was interesting and what was bunk.
For example, the new Sabrina series. I've barely gotten to the second season and already have rolled my eyes enough to bring flour for a bake shop. But I look at it like a parody of what Christian fundamentalism sees. Poking fun in extremes and set in a world where this is how it works there. As if it was some separate, parallel world.
But even then there is an occasional scene that says something to catch interest. A line dropped here or a choice made there which harkens to just enough truth to be interesting. My personal favorite so far is the scene of the exorcism of the devouring worm. Describing an exorcism as relying on the will of the caster over depending on a higher force is a nice stroke. And during the actual ritual, having them calling on ancestors both familial and to the tradition itself gave the moment a lot of believable (if fantastical) gravitas.
Fun? Yes. Real? Absolutely-mostly not. Was there a grain of wisdom hidden among the folds for people in-the-know to pick at? ...Maybe. But just enough to capture interest for the entertainment of a specific portion of the audience. Maybe one could consider it fan service of a sort.
In the end, my advice to people on this sort of subject is twofold.
First, sometimes wisdom can be found in the most unexpected of places, if you have the right eyes to see it.
Second, Taking fictional stories too seriously is bad for your happiness. Enjoy things for what they are. Do not expect reality from the unreal, when you can instead point and laugh with the farce of it all.
