George A. Romero’s Season of the Witch is a slow-burn feminist occult drama

George A. Romero is obviously best known as the father of the modern zombie movie. But between inventing the genre with Night of the Living Dead and his outbreak horror, The Crazies, Romero made two much lesser-known films: There’s Always Vanilla, which I’ll admit I’ve never seen, and Season of the Witch, or, as it was originally titled, Hungry Wives.

乔治·A·罗梅罗（George A. Romero）显然以现代僵尸电影之父的身份而闻名。但在凭借《活死人之夜》（Night of the Living Dead）开创该类型片，以及拍摄疫情恐怖片《活死人之地》（The Crazies）之间，罗梅罗还制作了两部鲜为人知的电影：《总是香草》（There’s Always Vanilla，我承认我从未看过）以及《巫术季节》（Season of the Witch，原名为《饥饿的妻子们》（Hungry Wives））。

Hungry Wives was supposed to be an exploitation film. The studio marketed it as a softcore porn, but it failed to find an audience — probably because the movie features minimal nudity, just one sex scene, and lots of talking. It was an undeniable flop upon its release in 1973. It was eventually rereleased as Season of the Witch after Romero’s Dawn of the Dead sparked renewed interest in his work.

《饥饿的妻子们》本应是一部剥削电影。制片厂将其作为软色情片进行营销，但未能吸引到观众——这可能是因为电影中几乎没有裸露镜头，仅有一场性爱戏，且充斥着大量对话。该片在1973年上映时无疑是一次惨败。直到罗梅罗的《活死人黎明》（Dawn of the Dead）重新引发人们对他作品的兴趣后，它才最终以《巫术季节》为名重新发行。

While sadly, Romero’s original 130-minute cut of the film has been lost, parts of it have been recovered and restored, expanding the 89-minute original release to 104 minutes. An obvious reason for its failure, beyond the distributor butchering it by cutting 40 minutes, is that what Romero made wasn’t softcore porn; instead, it’s a slow-burn feminist drama where the occult is almost incidental.

遗憾的是，罗梅罗最初130分钟的剪辑版已经遗失，但部分片段已被找回并修复，使最初89分钟的公映版延长到了104分钟。除了发行商删减40分钟导致影片支离破碎外，其失败的一个明显原因是：罗梅罗制作的并非软色情片，而是一部慢热型的女性主义剧情片，其中神秘学元素几乎只是点缀。

Protagonist Joan Mitchell is trapped in an abusive marriage and unhappy with her role as a submissive housewife. She eventually turns to therapy, then to witchcraft, in an attempt to escape her humdrum life.

主角琼·米切尔（Joan Mitchell）被困在一段充满虐待的婚姻中，对作为顺从家庭主妇的角色感到不满。为了逃离平庸的生活，她最终求助于心理治疗，随后又转向了巫术。

Season of the Witch has its issues, for sure. The production value is quite low — apparently the movie was made for just $100,000 (around $800,000 adjusted for inflation). The acting is also wildly uneven. While star Jan White turns in an excellent performance, others appear to be reading off cue cards or chew scenery with Pacino-levels of camp.

《巫术季节》确实存在问题。其制作水准相当低——显然这部电影的制作成本仅为10万美元（按通货膨胀调整后约为80万美元）。表演也极其参差不齐。虽然主演简·怀特（Jan White）贡献了出色的表演，但其他人看起来像是在照着提示卡念台词，或者像帕西诺（Pacino）那样夸张地表演。

Still, there’s something compelling about Romero’s directing and his, for the time, boldly progressive take on feminism. For all of its reliance on dialogue over action, Season of the Witch still manages a tense and, at times, hallucinatory atmosphere. And it all leads to a somewhat predictable, but still extremely satisfying ending.

尽管如此，罗梅罗的导演手法以及他在当时看来大胆且进步的女性主义视角依然引人入胜。尽管该片更多依赖对话而非动作，但《巫术季节》依然营造出了一种紧张且时而带有幻觉色彩的氛围。这一切最终导向了一个虽有些可预测，但依然极其令人满意的结局。