Children of Artemis - Witchcraft & Wicca

Sleepy Hollow

It is 1799, and Ichabod Crane (Johnny Depp) is an edgy New York constable, a sharp-witted sleuth blessed with an affinity for scientific practices, especially in the field of pathology. When three corpses are discovered - headless - in the borough of Sleepy Hollow, Crane is sent by the stern Burgomaster (Christopher Lee) to investigate.

Crane soon enough finds himself in the tiny Dutch village, where his appearance prompts the paranoid shutting of lead glass windows. (once again Depp plays the lovable outsider.) As soon as the forlorn elegance of the town is established, Crane makes the acquaintance of the fey Katrina Van Tassel (Christina Ricci), whose father, Baltus (Michael Gambon), and mother, the Lady Van Tassel (Miranda Richardson), are counted among Sleepy Hollow's elite. Their wealth cannot save them, however, from the murderous headless horseman (Christopher Walken), a ghostly mercenary with a penchant for decapitation.

The rest of the towns elite including Reverend Steenwyck (Jeffrey Jones), Magistrate Philipse (Richard Griffiths), Doctor Lancaster (Ian McDiarmid), and Notary Hardenbrook (Michael Gough) relate the demons tale to Crane, who sets out immediately to crack the case. Death continues to visit the town, with the horseman's arrival heralded by impressive blasts of lightning through the mist. Unsupported and even shunned by the people he's striving to save, Crane performs messy autopsies and messier interviews, convinced that the culprit is a flesh-and-blood man until he encounters the ghoul head-on.

Thereafter, he swiftly deduces that the evil spirit is intimately linked to a mystery among the villagers. Teamed with Katrina and the orphaned Young Masbath (Marc Pickering) and plagued by dreams of his own doomed mother, Crane makes the dissolution of this evil his spiritual quest. Sleepy Hollow's strength is in its look, which is jaw-droppingly beautiful, a personal best for director Tim Burton, aided by cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki. The movie's style, with its icy glow and masterful use of shadow and fog, is comparable to Burton's Edward Scissorhands or Batman. But unlike those outings, Sleepy Hollow dodges suburban kitsch and cold modernism and delivers a lush, hammeresque landscape. Highly Recommended.