You Won’t Be Alone is the most beautiful movie about witches ever made

polygon.com:

The Polygon team is reporting in from the all-virtual grounds of the 2022 Sundance International Film Festival, with a look at the next wave of upcoming independent releases in sci-fi, horror, and documentary film.

Reflection is an act of love. It’s why when I’m holding my friend’s child, I mimic their expressions, showing their feelings on my face. Why my wife, to make me laugh, contorts her nose and mouth to look like mine does when I’m feeling overwhelmed. Why it’s hard to face someone who’s weeping without feeling tears of your own. When we use our bodies to show others who we see them to be, we show them who we are, and that there is room for them within us. That’s what love is, after a fashion.

You Won’t Be Alone is built around reflection. The feature debut of Australian writer-director Goran Stalevski is a horror film of sorts, though it’s less about scaring the audience, and more about contemplating the possible fear of being perceived and perceiving others, courting their acceptance and risking their rejection. Stalevski expresses that horror viscerally through violence, through blood and guts and witchcraft.

Set in 19th-century Macedonia, the film follows Nevena, a feral, abandoned young witch (Sara Klimoska) who stumbles upon an isolated village. Curious about the people she sees there, she wants to live among them, but not as a witch, with her telltale claws and ageless body. In the folkloric tradition the film draws from, witches have the power to shapeshift through gory means, by placing the guts of dead things within their own bodies. So when Nevena accidently kills a villager, she takes the opportunity to assume her identity, and begins the first of several lives as a human.

You Won’t Be Alone is largely