Hungry Wives (1972)

Sorry, this movie sucks

Really Surprised!

A waste of 90 minutes of my life

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

This is nearly an auteur film for George Romero, acting as director, editor, cinematographer and screenwriter (with his wife producing). Inspired by the occult and feminism, two major movements of the early 70s that play nicely together, the film was shot with a small crew for $100,000 (originally budgeted for a quarter million).The film had issues finding distribution, with several of them demanding hard core scenes. Jack H. Harris (producer of The Blob, Equinox, Eyes of Laura Mars and Dark Star) finally distributed it as Hungry Wives, cutting nearly 41 minutes from the films running time (the version on the Anchor Bay DVD is still missing 26 minutes, which are presumably lost forever as the original film negative and director's cut are thought to be gone forever).The film has the feel of pornography with none of the payoff, something noticed by critics. Others consider it a film that's unsure of its approach — indeed, how do you follow up a film like Night of the Living Dead which totally nails it and reinvents the horror genre without doing more horror? Romero's efforts in this period feel like avoidance — yet knowing that the grave (slumming it in the horror genre) beckons.Joan Mitchell is Jack's wife, introduced to us as walking through the woods that look eerily similar to the Evans City gravesite that opens Night of the Living Dead. Together, they live in the Forest Hills suburb of Pittsburgh (this movie is so yinzer that it thanks Foodland in the opening credits) with Nikki, their 19-year-old daughter. Much like many of the characters of Romero, they're Catholic and find their faith ill-equipped for the changes that the end of the 20th century brings to them.Read more at http://bit.ly/2yx7Om2

"Hungry Wives" aka "Season of the Witch". OK there are movies that work better when they are fast-paced, some that work better at a mid-pace, and other films are better at a slow-pace. This film is not slow-paced it's slower than a snail's pace - it's at a dragging-pace, painfully slow.A housewife is bored. She has a husband that is not home most of the time and when he is home it's a stale relationship. She has a daughter that has her own life and really doesn't care about her. She has gossipy friends that are rather a bore as well. So she's alone most all the time and utterly bored so she decides to try witchcraft as a solution - to spice up her life I guess. Well, we finally get about 10 minutes of her witchcraft which doesn't amount to a hill of beans - a love spell of all things - this leads us to adultery which she seems to like more than her new found hobby witchcraft. At the end, she grows tired of her lover. Oh and she starts telling others "I'm a witch".I think the witchcraft is suppose to be a metaphor for real life women's lib movement that was still going on at the time of this film - but was shown as literal witchcraft in this film.There was some stink about the releasing of this film - and was marketed as soft-core porn much to the displeasure of Romero -- so I read somewhere. Makes no sense to me after watching this film... it would barely qualify as soft-core porn if it does at all. And the cut footage was cut to qualify it as soft-core porn in the 70s - do what?! Seems that is what they cut was soft-core porn bits but whatever. I just know there is cut footage that was later found and pieced back to create another release of this film. The film is boring and talky not close to soft-core porn that I can tell.2/10

Season of the WitchWomen gravitate towards Wicca, because unlike Christianity it doesn't consider them to be the harbingers of sin.Unfortunately, this horror movie about the earth-centric religion is not the best example of that aforementioned assertion.Plagued with recurring nightmares of her traveling husband, bored housewife Joan (Jan White) seeks the spiritual counsel of her tarot card-reading neighbour (Virginia Greenwald), who is also the head priestess of the neighbourhood coven.Convinced that she too is a witch, Joan goes a little nutty, which results in her using witchcraft to seduce her daughter's TA, and get away with murder.A psychological trip through the mind of a lonely housewife, Season of the Witch is a less- zombified movie than what director George A. Romero is known for; however, it's just as insightful.As for which one is hotter: zombie or witch? When you get Skyclad with a witch their decomposing genitals don't fall off. (Yellow Light)

Fresh off of his success of Night of the Living Dead, Romero tried expanding his skill set as a director. Although Romero's second film takes a short break from horror with 1971's There's Always Vanilla, Hungry Wives jumps right back into the game. This film goes by a few different names, one by of the name of Season of the Witch - this is often confused with the third film in the Halloween franchise released in 1982, also entitled Season of the Witch. To clear up any further confusion, many people just refer to Romero's film as Hungry Wives.This film tells the story of a group of bored and restless housewives that are uncomfortable with aging. A member of their group, and the butt-end of their humor without her knowledge, is a practitioning Witch. The story focuses in on the protagonist, Joan Mitchell, who expresses interest in learning the mystical arts while sharing the same hopeless outlook on life as her companions.Although the premise may sound like a straight forward plot the execution that follows thereafter is anything but linear. I was expecting this film to follow in the footsteps of most occult-themed titles of the time that rose in popularity as a result of mainstream coverage and celebrity interest in Anton Lavey's newly-established Church of Satan. This formation of beliefs caused a resurgence of interest in the occult between high-ranking members of society and film- makers alike. Hungry Wives ignores religion; choosing to tackle issues concerning the always-flawed ideology of social and gender roles. Female empowerment is a prominent theme on display and this wouldn't be the last time Romero would shine light on societal issues. There are plenty of vague scenes that offer little substance. As with most Romero films, you have a low-end cast full of actors and actresses that either use their amateur experience as a stepping stone for improvement or a paycheck to get by. Thankfully, in every Romero film I've seen, the acting is tolerable. When you've scraped the bottom of the barrel for so long you come to appreciate some semblance of talent - because seriously, you can't even begin to imagine the rigors or hardship of sitting through a movie like 1980's Anthropophagous, a dwelling so deep beneath the Earth that it ends up in China.The film's conclusion manages to incite a "...what the...." response, but the path one must take to reach that point is a slow and arduous one. I'm actually on the fence when it comes to Hungry Wives - there are some moments that'll make you regret saying negative things about the movie while on the other hand it's difficult to remember anything great about it. In recent years, Romero has made his displeasure known when asked about this film - there are various clues that point to a large amount of editing that took place as the film's original release was cut from 130 minutes to 89 minutes. Despite Romero's self-deprecation, Hungry Wives need only be seen by Romero purists.**A young female actress (maybe in her early 20's back then) by the name of Joedda McClain played a role in Hungry Wives - it was her first and last film. There are fans who express interest in wondering where she disappeared to. I was almost certain I found her on Facebook, and decided to write her a message. Needless to say she never wrote me back. Geesh Joedda, I was merely curious of any details I could use in my review! Help me out here! This is a true story, by the way.