Plot Summary: After her husband commits suicide, Grace is preyed upon by her landlord who accuses her of being a witch after she rejects him. Grace relies on her faith to get through her ordeal.
Over a couple of years, there have been movies promoting feminism but some of them have been so over the top, just to please SJW, that what we get to see is a ridiculous plot where men are completely incompetent.
Even as a woman it is uncomfortable to watch how the story is twisted to the point that it is the men who need saving while the female characters manage to "save the day" is nothing short of a miracle.
Somehow a crocodile doesn't attack only the women. A serial killer whose main target is a woman manages to kill all her friends and especially her guy friends only to be outwitted by the protagonist in the end.
So when The Reckoning began and the focus was on Grace as she read the suicide letter her husband left behind, I cringed and not only because the actress hammed through the scene.
But then the movie progressed, and I was pleasantly surprised at the way the story unfolded as well as the way the characters and feminism were handled. You might just want to cheer for the actors by the end of the movie.
THE RECKONING Movie Plot
As mentioned before, the movie begins with some terrible overacting as Grace reads the letter that is intercut with scenes from when she tries to stop her husband from going into town. It is 1665 for heaven's sake and rats are running amok in the streets.
But Grace's husband Joseph has been growing grain in his land and needs to sell them rather than let it for and not earn money to pay the rent. Tough call.
So he leaves, returns and keeps coughing. Grace tells him in the middle of the night that she knows about some berries in the forest that could cure him.
She leaves but Joseph knows no amount of berries and the vitamin C in them is going to help him recover from the plague. So he climbs atop a tree that looks like it has branches that can't hold his weight and then hangs from it.
Grace screams upon returning, unable to believe she has to take care of their newborn Abby all by herself, tend to the land, reject the squire's advances and then endure torture while the whole town called her a witch.
But Joseph does kill himself and leaves barely a few coins for Grace. That is all he got with the grain he sold in the town?
Grace gets more dramatic and uses a sword to cut him down. Takes her three tries to do so. It is 1665 so everyone had swords and guns in their homes to ward off wood animals and lecherous men.
Also, when she leaves to get the berries she is in her nightgown but when she is reading the letter, she dresses all up and makes her hair before doing her terrible crying.
She buries him and then sets about to return to her normal routine by scattering seeds all around the fields and cooing at her baby.
Then one day she gets a knock on the door and it is the squire, asking for rent and showing no sympathy for the widow. Grace tells him sternly that she could get the money and tells him to come next week. The squire laughs at her confidence. It is the time of the great plague, wherever would she be able to procure the money?
But Grace thinks she can ask the bartender in the town who regularly served her husband.
The next morning she rides her horse towards town when she runs into her friend Kate and her husband. Kate immediately offers to take care of the baby as soon as she learns Kate has observed the plague protocols and doesn't seem infected.
Grace rides into town and meets with a depressing sight. The town is overrun with rats who are happily scampering away because this is a cat-free zone.
Grace goes to the inn and is almost laughed at. Business is down because of the plague and did she really expect a loan? She doesn't leave with coins but does get a hint that her husband's stein may have been purposely exchanged with the infected's.
She leaves town but not before wanting to watch more dead people who have succumbed to the plague, being thrown into the cart.
At night she dreams about her rotting husband again who leads her to his grave. Rather than removing her ring first, Grace is more than happy to pry his wedding ring off first.
When the squire returns pretty much the next day even though she asked for a week's time, she gives him the ring and asks for three months. The squire knows the plague isn't going away anytime soon and reminds her she wouldn't be able to do anything after three months.
She goes away with her ring too for three more months but the squire becomes impatient. He didn't want the germ-ridden coins but her.
The squire's help feels bad for Grace as he stands outside overhearing the ruckus but just as he's about to intervene, Grace has already managed to defend herself by arming herself with a gun.
The squire leaves but promises revenge.
He heads to the inn and riles up the townsfolk, convincing them that Grace is a witch. The townsfolk have yet to learn how the plague has spread and don't want to blame the rats and the fleas. Nope, it's the witches.
Not satisfied with hanging one woman, they all decide they want to accuse more women of being witches and hope one of them is the very witch that caused the plague. Could Grace be that witch?
Soon enough Grace is captured, has her house burned down, and separated from her daughter. One of her captors is Kate's husband who doesn't like any of his wife's friends.
Grace is thrown into a cell and Moorcroft is called, a known witch hunter. His assistant is Ursula, a woman who was once accused of being a witch and burned but was saved because of the rain which made Moorcroft think she has been cleansed.
Grace is publicly flogged, is poked with nails, and is subjected to intense torture with things inserted inside her. Yet, she maintains she's not a witch. At this point, even the squire starts feeling bad for her.
But Grace is haunted by nightmares wherein the devil himself is forcing himself on her and scratching her throat which leaves marks when she awakens. She keeps seeing Joseph and her mother who was also burned after being accused of witchcraft. She is told to remember who she was.
Grace believes she's strong and so is her faith. She was after all given a cross by her husband.
Meanwhile, she also enlists the help of the squire's assistant to track down her daughter. She is told her baby is safe and Grace sets about making a plan.
She is all dressed up and meets with Moorcroft. In the meantime, the squire's assistant bashes the squire with a pee pot and takes Abby away.
THE RECKONING Ending Explained with Spoilers!
Grave gives Moorcroft wine to gulp down and she does so as well. She then reveals that the wine was spiked with infected blood and that she wanted revenge after he accused her mother of being a witch all those years ago.
She stabs his hand and leaves a gun for him. Ursula decides she wants to attack a woman accused of witchcraft. There's no thing as empathy for her. She was after all accused of being a witch too, yet she doesn't want to stop Moorcroft from subjecting women to inhumane torture. She attacks Grace who fights back and then in the struggle, a fire begins which consumes Ursula immediately.
Grace feels sorry for her but leaves as soon as possible from that place.
She goes out and meets her baby but doesn't touch her. She lets the boy and her baby through the gate and then cuts the rope.
The boy reveals the squire had exchanged the pitchers and there was no infected blood in the one she drank with Moorcroft. So she wasn't infected too.
Grace doesn't slap her head and say oops but does try to open the gate.
Realising she doesn't have the muscles for it, she tells the boy to take her baby to her Kate who will know what to do.
Of course, Kate knows what to do. After refusing to call her friend a witch, her husband had thrown her off the cart and meant to hurt her when she threw a stone at the horse and have the cart ridden over her husband's skull.
When the boy arrives with the baby, she knows she's been given another chance to be happy and escape the town before she goes to jail for murder.
Grace on the other hand fights valiantly before jumping into a well. She manages to end up at the sea with a sword.
The words on the screen give a brief history of how many women perished after being accused of witchcraft and causing the plague. Grace looks into the distance and is probably wondering just exactly she's going to find her daughter.
Kate knows exactly what to do, but does Grace know what Kate meant to do?
The Reckoning is a decent movie with okay horror scenes and for once, you do end up rooting for feminism rather than wondering if it is being pushed down your throat and making all the male characters seem evil and useless.
For once, feminism is portrayed for what it is, equality.
Scare scale: 3.5/5
was ursula a witch?
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