Sold as a sex film and cut by 40 minutes, Romero's witchcraft drama now plays in a longer 104-minute version. Here is what each cut gives you.
George A. Romero's Season of the Witch, made between Night of the Living Dead and his later zombie films, was butchered on release. The distributor cut Romero's 130-minute film to 89 minutes, renamed it Hungry Wives and sold it as softcore porn in 1973. It flopped, then returned under its current title after Dawn of the Dead became a hit.
The original cut and negative are lost, but recovered footage produced a 104-minute extended version. Arrow Video's Blu-ray adds a new 4K restoration of the roughly 90-minute theatrical cut.
George A. Romero’s distributor took his witchcraft film, cut 40 minutes out of it, renamed it Hungry Wives and sold it as softcore porn. It flopped. Half a century later, the movie Romero actually made, a quiet feminist drama called Season of the Witch, is finally getting the attention it never had on release.
If you only know Romero for Night of the Living Dead and the zombie films that followed, this is the gap in his career worth filling, especially around Halloween. It is not a gore film. It is a slow, talky and often unsettling portrait of a woman trying to escape a life that was chosen for her, and the restored versions make it easier to see what he was going for.
The Season of the Witch restoration is really two things, and it helps to know which one you are watching. Romero’s own cut ran 130 minutes. The distributor trimmed it to 89 minutes for the 1973 release, and both that original cut and the camera negative are now lost.
What survives is a patchwork. Pieces of Romero’s longer version were found and edited back in, producing a 104-minute extended version that first appeared on DVD in 2005. Some of the recovered scenes look noticeably rougher than the rest, because they come from poorer source material.
The best-looking option is newer. Arrow Video’s Blu-ray includes a fresh 4K restoration of the theatrical version, scanned from the camera negative of that cut and running about 90 minutes, plus the 104-minute extended version as an alternate. So you choose between the sharpest picture and the most complete story.
The story follows Joan Mitchell, a 39-year-old woman in suburban Pittsburgh. Her husband Jack is successful, often away on business and controlling, and the marriage turns abusive. Joan is bored and unhappy with the role of obedient housewife, and she is having nightmares about being dominated.
She tries therapy first. Then she hears about a new neighbor rumored to practice witchcraft, goes over for a tarot reading with a friend, and starts reading up on spells herself. Each step pulls her further from the life everyone expects her to keep living.
The witchcraft is almost beside the point. Romero said at the time that the film was not really a horror movie and that it touches the occult only around the edges. He also called it a feminist film. The supernatural works as a way for Joan to imagine power she does not have at home, and the closing scene lands that idea with a dry, quiet sting.
Romero shot the film in 1972 on 16mm with a tiny crew in the Pittsburgh suburbs, working as writer, editor and cameraman himself. The budget was supposed to be $250,000 and was cut to $100,000 during production.
Its original title was Jack’s Wife. The distributor renamed it Hungry Wives and marketed it as sexploitation, which set audiences up for something the film was never going to deliver. There is very little nudity, only one sex scene, and a lot of conversation. Romero had refused pressure to make the love scenes pornographic, and distributors had complained that his cut was too wordy.
The film only resurfaced after Dawn of the Dead became a hit in 1978. That success sparked interest in Romero’s earlier work, and the movie was reissued under the title it carries today.
That depends on what you want from a Halloween movie. If you want jump scares and zombies, this is not it. If you like slow-burn character studies with a creeping sense of unease, it is a rewarding watch and a fascinating look at where Romero’s head was between his first two horror hits.
Be ready for its rough edges. The low budget shows, and the acting is very uneven. Jan White is excellent as Joan and carries the film, while some of the supporting cast sound like they are reading lines or play it as broad camp. Still, the dream sequences build a tense, hallucinatory mood, and Romero’s view of women’s lives was bold for its time.
Which version to pick:
For viewers, the real value here is context. Season of the Witch shows Romero using genre to talk about everyday life, the same instinct that made his zombie films about more than monsters. It also pairs naturally with his later vampire drama Martin, another small, character-driven Pittsburgh film.
Romero’s full 130-minute cut is unlikely to return, since both the negative and that version are gone. For now, the extended edit is the closest anyone can get to the film he set out to make.
Not really. Romero described it as a film that deals with the occult only on the side; it plays as a slow feminist drama with eerie dream sequences.
The extended version runs 104 minutes, while the 4K restoration of the theatrical cut runs about 90 minutes. Romero’s original 130-minute cut is lost.
The distributor gave it that title to sell it as a sex film. Romero had shot it as Jack’s Wife, and it was renamed Season of the Witch for its later reissue.
You're reading the quick version.
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