Unless you feel compelled to see every witch movie set in some unlucky medieval village, you can probably skip Syfy's new "Witchville."
Even to people who aren't students of witch flicks, this one feels pretty formulaic, give or take a beautiful blond in a cowl.
Luke Goss, a hot ticket in the sci-fi world, plays Malachy, who has inherited a kingdom from his recently deceased father.
Dad didn't leave the kingdom in very good shape, alas. The Red Queen (Sarah Douglas) thinks the kingdom should be hers and has been casting spells and perpetrating other witchy treachery that has left the citizenry demoralized and impoverished.
Malachy, who has been out of town, doesn't grasp the scope of the problem until he rides into the village with his brothers Erik (Andrew Pleavin) and Jason (hunky young Ed Speleers).
They soon run into Heinrich Kramer (Simon Thorp), a professional witch hunter. That was a career option in medieval times.
Kramer starts to explain what's going on, and admits he is frustrated. He tried to get Malachy's father to join the battle against the Red Queen and it didn't work out, what with the king ending up dead and all.
The brothers remain skeptical until Kramer brings a dead rabbit back to life, at which point Malachy signs on and they head out to confront the Red Queen.
The queen has the power to cast spells and do great damage by blowing red clouds through the air. She also has traditional muscled-up goons and a lovely daughter, the mysterious Jozefa (MyAnna Buring).
Jozefa is the wild card. While she will inherit the kingdom if her mother wins, she also seems attracted to Jason, for reasons you don't need witchcraft to grasp.
Malachy and Kramer gather a posse along the way, enlisting an outlaw gang led by a tattooed woman played by Gillian Tan.
The two sides finally get around to their inevitable showdown, which features both conventional bloodshed and the X factor of all those spells.
Movies like this often rely on the quality of their special effects, and alas, the effects here turn out to be nothing special.
Many are filmed in semi-darkness, as is customary when the filmmakers don't have a huge budget. Nor do the spells have a particularly interesting visual impact on their victims.
It's less of an issue that the acting often feels stilted and stylized. That's what sci-fi movies often demand, because it makes them feel more like part of the alternate world they're creating.
In the end, "Witchville" just doesn't feel very enchanting.
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