Amish Witches: The True Story of Holmes County (TV Movie 2016) Poster

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4/10
Not remotely true
terijolc8 April 2022
Shouldn't there be some sort of law or even industry standard against falsely claiming this is real and especially that the footage is ACTUAL REAL footage?
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3/10
Amateurish
Tak00529 October 2018
If you think Blair Witch in Amish Country then you have this movie. Unfortunately a lot of the acting is poor. When you combine that with the hand held camera effect it just comes off as amateurish.
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4/10
Why did this get 6.8
jacobjohntaylor114 November 2016
OK I can think of some found footage horror movie that are very scary. This is not one of them. I do not by that this is real. I think this is just another Blair witch phoney thing. The story line in this movie is awful. It is a very slow movie. I could not be scared of this movie. maybe if I though it was really. I do not buy that is real. Do not wast your time. Do not wast your money. Do not see this movie. It is not a very good movie. 6.8 is just overrating. I give it 4 out of 10. I could not be scared by this. It is just campy. Do not see it. I need more line and I am running out of things to say. I am in a l.i.b.a.r.y that is about to close.
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1/10
So bad
thebigh-382779 August 2022
I found this on discovery plus and knew it was fake before it even started. To find Amish - true Amish -in Holmes county who are willing to be filmed is not really a thing. I'm from that area. The Amish have a very specific accent that they didn't even bother having the bad actors replicate. So another indicator. It's so bad I don't even know how it got the rating it did. And married Amish have a beard. No mustache. Never understood the movie producers who think adding true story to a movie when it's not was ever cool. It just makes me turn it off immediately. Don't bother. It's not even a good Blair witch spoof.
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1/10
Very Misleading
Twerpster1 August 2022
I am pretty sure this is anything but a true story. The description of the show is very misleading. It's just a bunch of horrible no name actors trying to make a few bucks. I could not even finish the show it was so poorly done.
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1/10
Awful and Not True
comptonranch16 August 2022
I started this in Discovery+ thinking it was actually true. About 12 seconds in, I realized it wasn't actually a documentary. The actors aren't even remotely decent. Lifetime has better actors. Lmao So a quick Google and about 6 seconds, I found that this is not actually a true story and is a scripted show. Not reality at all. Why this is advertised as true is beyond me, I'm really disappointed, and somewhat offended that anyone would try to pass this off as a documentary. Such crap. I turned it off after 3 minutes. And that was about 2 minutes and 48 seconds (see above) too long.
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6/10
True Story
ainemckenna29 October 2018
The fact this movie is not a "true" story, was the BIG down fall 4 me!
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1/10
Not a True story.
ktroyer137 July 2020
I'm from this community. I belonged to a different less strict group of Amish as a little girl, but we had swartzentruber friends. I still visit frequently. You wouldn't see a sign welcoming you to the swartzentruber settlement. The Amish (actors) depicted in this movie are not swartzentruber.
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6/10
True or no true
sammi_gayle16 November 2022
I've done a lot of research on the Amish and I do believe this. I've had the pleasure of meeting Amish what would you folks when I was going through Ohio and they're just like any other sect of people, look at Scientology they cover up everything they don't want you in their little world just like the Amish. The Swartzentruber one of the oldest of the Amish, then like to hide things that's why no running water no electricity and so forth. I do believe on the things that I researched this is a true thing and not anywhere should be compared to the Blair witch product as someone said earlier in a review.
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1/10
Fake, bad, awful
afamouspetty28 August 2022
When a film tries to sell you truth and they are too lazy to even research Amish people and how they live with rules it's already a mess from the get go. The dialog was dumb and the flow just wasn't working. It was fake, the acting wasn't good at all, and a lot of fails when thinking of the Amish and they way they actually live. The male character didn't have a beard and he was old enough to have one, cameras would never be allowed under any circumstance, the female pretended not to understand things but clearly did, and the acting was bad- some of the worst I've seen. It was so incredibly frustrating I couldn't even finish it. Knowing it isn't true even though selling it as a true story made it worse. It's felt like an even lower budget Blair Witch movie and whomever wrote it should at least research the "people" they are portraying.
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9/10
Highly enjoyable and creepy effort
kannibalcorpsegrinder7 November 2016
Arriving in a small Ohio town, a TV crew sent to document a reclusive Amish sect instead come to find that the passing of a town figure thought to be a powerful witch sets off a storm of paranormal activity and must help them try to rid the spirit before they're all targeted.

This here turned out to be quite a decent and surprisingly enjoyable effort. What makes this one quite enjoyable is the fact that this one really manages to make for a truly coherent reason for the found-footage aspect of the potential show they're filming. Looking into the practices of a reclusive and isolated sect of this particular community makes for a solid enough premise to be this type of found-footage effort, and the footage shot at the beginning where they go about amongst the community sets up their particular brand of lifestyle as an interesting one with a lot of great points that get twisted around later on. Those turn into quite decent and chilling hauntings at times, nicely starting out with simple events like the knocking on the doors and finding hand-prints on the windows to much more impactful and chilling as there's the series of furniture-arranging and flashing images of people running around outside which makes for a rather fine start-up to the later scenes which are much more intensive and chilling. The bedroom scenes showing the one girl getting possessed and forced out into the rest of the house to rearrange the furniture and culminating in the burning scarecrow outside their door which is a rather fun series of encounters throughout here, and once they review the footage for the girls the next day seeing what really happened makes for one of the more effective and creepy scenes in the film as a whole. The final half here, where the supernatural antics are greatly increased with the added spiritual desecrations featured here alongside the chilling actions of the girls getting supernaturally forced into different accidents in the different houses which are being caught on great angles by the hidden cameras all really mesh together to give this one a rather enjoyable and high-energy series of action scenes that bring this to a nice finish quite well. These here manage to give this one enough to hold it out over the few flaws that are found here. The main issue here is the fact that there's quite a limp and rather tame finale, with the meeting in the diner really ending this one on a rather pedestrian finish. Considering the frantic action that leads up to it beforehand, there's a rather weak ending to this one that is quite confusing and makes for a downbeat and confusing entry. The only other factor against this one is the seemingly different viewpoint it has towards what's causing the supernatural action throughout here, giving several different answers for what's happening that contradict each other which doesn't get fully resolved until the end, and it really gives this a scatterbrained mentality at times when it can't decide what's going on. These here are what holds this back.

Rated Unrated/R: Violence.
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6/10
Hmm Interesting
xstacybloodcatx8 June 2023
I see a lot of people leaving bad reviews after claiming of having watched the first couple of minutes. How anyone would listen to someone that has not even watched the full movie is beyond me. Don't watch the movie thinking it is based off a true story, it is not true.

Amish Witch is a B rated movie with a Blair Witch vibe. It claims to be true, just like the producers did with Blair Witch. Is this false advertising? Could be but if you streamed the movie for free, like I am on youtube, then no it is not false advertising because i lost no monitary value. If you watched the movie in full and still did not like it, then that is on you.

The acting is that of a B movie, it is to be expected. Those who say the movie has no plot it does. The plot is about a woman shunned by her community for being what they believed a witch. Did the plot play out well? I do not know yet as i am still watching the movie. The representation of the Amish i would agree is not accurate. They portray them to be imbicilic to technological devices, phones, headphones, cameras. The Amish know what these things are, some Amish have simple tvs or radios in their homes. The Amish is about living a simple life and following their respective beliefs, some have accents, German or Dutch for the most part, which was not portrayed in the movie.

So far what i have seen is not bad but is it grammy material? No. It is decent thus far. Interesting is the word that comes to mind. I am curious of how it turns out and should it get to the point of "garbage" i will update my review but thus far...it is decent.
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2/10
I lived near the Holmes Co Amish for 40 years. So Fake!
kcitraro28 October 2022
I'm from Middlefield Ohio. About an hour from Holmes County and the second largest Amish community in Ohio. First, the Amish guide is not Amish. He is English. Everything about him is wrong. His clothes, his hair. His lack of Amish dialect or accent. Real Amish don't talk like him. The girls are acting like they've never seen earphones or iPhones before. They've all used one and many own them . These girls are not Amish. Their Dutch is not accurate. The sector of Amish is not known to any Amish I know. I watched 30 minutes and shut it down because I hate how badly they are representing Amish. Amish are hard working normal people. They are right there as a neighbor when you need help. They are simple and don't allow technology most of the time. But they are not witches or conspiracists. This movie does not do anything remotely associated with being a film. It does not have a plot, nor actors(of any quality) . This is the worst film I've seen in my lifetime. Pretend "reality" that it's not .. and horrible fake Amish actors. .. misrepresentation, did I say bad acting?.. total giveaways that these people are not Amish. This movie could have been made without using Amish setting as a backstop. Or using Amish at all. Or fake Amish that make real ones look crazy. What a horrible movie! Stop being racist toward Amish! Such a disappointment to see Amish being abused by these filmmakers.
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1/10
False
ozacompound-778715 October 2022
My family ran a health supplement company for over 80 years, and specifically did sales among the Amish community for more 60 of those years. I know Holmes County Ohio, and this is the worst portrayal of that community. Specifically the Swartzentrubers. I have gotten to know at least 30 Swartzentruber families and they are quite lovely people. Maybe actually going into the community and getting to know the Amish first hand will strip away the mystery and your fears. This so-called tv series is horrible. The acting is fake, the production is fake, and this story is fake. Do not watch. This is a perfect example of dumbing down viewers. Pathetic.
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1/10
Took 60 seconds to see its no "true story"
erinsart2 January 2023
Warning: Spoilers
Not only is the terrible acted roles a dead giveaway but as a Lancaster , Pa the narratives and mannerisms of the "Amish" are so far off I laughed literally out load for the entire film. It was so bad I found it worth watching , which says a lot for I am very particular about what I waste my time on when it comes to TV. I felt a mix of amusement and pity for my Amish neighbors.

All you California and other viewers please know in no way is this real. At all.

My Amish neighbors sell me vegetables at market and yeah that's about it. Aside from being slightly annoying to drive behind on the roads. Although I will always allow them to live in Peace along side me. This isn't real. If you have an interest please research reality. Don't "Blair's witch" an entire legitimate culture. Please.
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1/10
Lazy effort
pedssurgeon3 October 2022
The film makers have made a very lazy attempt at what would have possibly been a very cool concept. I live in an Amish community area and they were lazy in their efforts and to even try the accents correctly. They have not tried getting any of the culture correct.

The film is shot poorly and does not give any thought to how you would have to shoot in this environment.

I was hoping for more of a Blair Witch project and in stead got more of an afterschool movie trying to be spooky.

Save yourself the time and not watch this horribly, culturally insensitive and inaccurate movie. Poor directing, productions and acting.
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1/10
NO Amish witches and NO Amish filmed!
CMT_31011 October 2023
Warning: Spoilers
Nevermind the bad acting, this movie is slanderous! I was born in Millersburg, the county seat for Holmes County Ohio. I have lived in Holmes and Wayne (neighboring) counties my whole life. First, there is no section of Holmes County that is strictly for the Swartzentruber Amish, as the sign at the beginning of the movie suggests. They are all over the place. I lived next door to a family of Swartzentruber Amish in Wayne County. Two teenaged boys, from the family, would use part of my barn to hide "English stuff", blue jeans, cowboy hats, cd player, and other things. They would sneak out of their house at night and "hang out" in my barn. I thought it was harmless, boys will be boys. My point is, they are no different than the English except for their religious beliefs. I didn't see a single thing in this movie that portrayed the Swartzentruber Amish truthfully. Even their buggies were wrong. These are the "plainest" of the Amish with the strongest German sounding dialect. Also the ones who take the passage 2 Corinthians 6, 17-18 , "Wherefore Come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord." the most seriously. Stop telling lies, Hollywood, about good and God fearing people!
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1/10
Terrible
prxmfpv21 October 2023
I live in central Pennsylvania surrounded by Amish people. I put this film on because I thought it was a true story. It is not. The actors are terrible. They do not sound, look, or act like real Amish people. Please don't watch this thinking it's a documentary or a learning experience. All you will learn is that the Amish are very misunderstood by the people that made this horrible film.

Listening to these actors talk was hilarious. Amish people talk with thick "Pennsylvania Dutch" accents when speaking English. They could not sound anymore unrealistic.

The Amish do not dress the way these people dress. They have strict rules about their clothing and bonnets, as well as their hairstyles and men's facial hair. This film is not even close.

The filmmakers really needed to do a lot more research before trying to make this film. They should be embarrassed.
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10/10
10/10
hnfsbj6 January 2023
This is one of the greatest movies ive ever seen. While i am biased for loving witch horror movies and living in ohio. I love this movie too much. Please watch it. I'm also a professional witch. This movie is very realistic and kept me on the edge of my seat. 10/0 acting, plot and props. Also as i woman i love watching the woman's POV. I have watched almost every Netflix, Hulu. And Amazon Prime horror movie. This sits at the same level as A24 Hereditary and Midsommar (2 of my fav movies ever). Overall. Fantastic. Ive made alll my friends watch it. Its the newest Blair Witch Project. (which i also love.)
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1/10
Worse than Blair Witch
pbowes-9716610 October 2022
I was willing to give this a try, because why not? I got under 20 minutes in and just couldn't watch any more, which is rare. I can normally finish bad movies for the heck of it because there's a glint of redeeming qualities. This one... no, not as far as I could get through.

I could look past the acting if the cameras were ever still. My cell phone taking video out of my front shirt pocket could produce better camera work. I'm going to assume it's "supposed to be bad" but you would think a "documentary" would be trying to occasionally have some decent camera work. I hate to say it, but just don't bother watching this.
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1/10
Not a true story at all considering this IMDb page lol
asamizashi5 November 2022
Aren't we living in a time where misinformation is frowned upon? Calling this a true story is clearly a lie just due to the fact that there is an IMDb page full of lesser known actors. If you're going to call something a true story, it damn sure should be a true story. They try to keep up the charade of a documentary by consistently shifting in and out of focus randomly and it gets pretty annoying. Interesting story though. I'm still going to finish it because I'm curious where the story goes, but I'm glad I checked here to confirm that the true story narrative is completely fabricated. I just wish they wouldn't do that.
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1/10
Why would Hulu buy this?!
Valid_ID16 October 2023
Honestly, I am flabbergasted by Hulu's decision to buy this hogwash!

There are student projects that are much better than this.

This movie requires the viewer suspend all belief; its lack of common sense makes it impossible to watch it for more than ten cringy minutes.

Moreover, the entire production lacks any professionalism, from the amateur acting, to the bad sound, shoddy camera action and lighting - all scream this is a bomb.

The user reviews here are spot on, most of them giving it 1-star. Of course, there is the ubiquitous nincompoop who claims this is the best film ever, but such nonsense is not backed up by anything, so it can be discarded.

So where the total rating of 4.5 stars comes from, along with popularity of this movie apparently on the raise, is a mystery.
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1/10
Why? Why didn't I read the reviews first???
hotto-8939727 November 2022
This movie is so stupid. I wish I had read the reviews first. Anyone who noted this is The Blair Witch Project meets the Amish is spot on. It's so predictable. The camera motion, like TBWP makes you want to vomit. The acting isn't the worse I've seen but certainly no acting awards will be handed out. The movie jumps around a bit. At the end, I asked myself WTH is Iva but be damned to go back to find out. Unless you are into "B" movies or scare easily and are looking for a mild "horror" movie you should probably save an hour+ of your time and just don't. That was my stupid fault for not reading the reviews first. Curse you HULU.
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1/10
garbage
redbyrde-892498 November 2022
I have known many amish. Cameras would never be allowed, and english is not spoken among themselves. This is not a true story. This was a casted poorly done story. I only watched about 30 minutes and decided it was an absolute waste of my time. The makers could at least spend some time with actual amish humans and get to know them before they made this insult to their lovely and hard working community instead of making this garbage and hiring actors and passing it off as a very poor blair witch clone. There was no option lower than one star or i would have given a negative star rating. Total waste of time.
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1/10
This is a positive review of a great movie--except it isn't.
lawrenceb5613 September 2023
Hey college friends! I've got a great idea. Remember how scary the Blair Witch Project was? Well check this out. We do the same thing--but with Amish people!!! I kid you not, the script writes itself! I honestly hoped this would be, if not scary--at least interesting because it's a true story. Guess what? It's not. That's kind of a genius marketing scheme, but not only is it not a "true" story---it's not a very "good" story either. I feel sorry for the good people of Holmes County for having to endure these punks and I wish they would have foregone their peaceful nature and run them over with their fast horses and buggies.
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