A remake of ‘The Witches’ is coming out soon

A long-brewing remake of “The Witches” is coming. Warner Bros. Pictures just announced it’ll release the new “Roald Dahl’s The Witches” film starring Anne Hathaway as the Grand High Witch on its streaming platform HBO Max on Oct. 22.

While the film will be available for streaming in the U.S., it’ll be released in theaters in other countries, according to Warner Bros. You can see the movie poster below from @wbpictures on Twitter.

Starring alongside Hathaway are Octavia Spencer as The Boy Bruno’s grandmother and Stanley Tucci as Mr. Stringer, the manager of the hotel where the witches’ conference takes place. Chris Rock narrates the film as a grown-up Bruno looking back.

Robert Zemeckis co-wrote the screenplay based on Dahl’s book, with Guillermo del Toro and Kenya Barris (“Black-ish”) also credited as co-writers. Zemeckis, who is best known for movies like “Back to the Future” and “Forrest Gump,” directed.

This new version of “The Witches” was originally slated for a worldwide theatrical release on Oct. 16, but COVID-19 led to the change. It’ll now stream on HBO Max here in the U.S., where in-theater viewing is still considered a high-risk activity and case numbers remain high in certain regions.

A 1990 version of the Roald Dahl book starred Anjelica Huston, was set in Norway and England, and traumatized many a child of the ’90s. The 2020 version is set in 1960s Alabama.

Take a peek at the trailer below.

The Huston-headlined film used Jim Henson’s artistry to create truly frightening unmasked faces for Huston and her fellow witches, and one YouTube commenter wasn’t convinced the new film could top it.

“All the CGI in the world will never beat the makeup job on Angelica Houston,” said user Juan Maldonado.

Others weren’t quite sure if Hathaway, who normally plays heroine roles, could pull off the villainess Grand High Witch role.

What do you think? Were you a fan of the book or 1990 film? Will you see this new version?