First Trailer for 'Roald Dahl's The Witches' Directed by Robert Zemeckis

"Witches!! They're real - and they haaaate children!" Warner Bros has unveiled the first official trailer for Roald Dahl's The Witches, a new live-action movie directed by the iconic filmmaker Robert Zemeckis (who most recently made Welcome to Marwen). Based on Roald Dahl's 1983 classic book "The Witches", the story tells the scary, funny and imaginative tale of a seven year old boy who has a run in with some real life witches. This isn't really a horror movie about scary witches, as much as it is a lively comedy (and something akin more to Harry Potter involving witch magic and a Grand High Witch and more). The extravagant cast features Anne Hathaway as the Grand High Witch, plus Octavia Spencer, Stanley Tucci, Kristin Chenoweth, Chris Rock, Charles Edwards, Morgana Robinson, plus newcomers Jahzir Kadeem Bruno (playing the boy at the center of the story) and Codie-Lei Eastick. This is skipping theaters and premiering on HBO Max later this month - in a few weeks! So far so good, very colorful and quite amusing.

Here's the first official trailer (+ poster) for Robert Zemeckis' The Witches, direct from WB's YouTube:

Reimagining Roald Dahl's beloved story for a modern audience, Robert Zemeckis' visually innovative film tells the darkly humorous and heartwarming tale of a young orphaned boy (Jahzir Bruno) who, in late 1967, goes to live with his loving Grandma in the rural Alabama town of Demopolis. As the boy and his grandmother encounter some deceptively glamorous but thoroughly diabolical witches, she wisely whisks our young hero away to an opulent seaside resort. Regrettably, they arrive at precisely the same time that the world's Grand High Witch (Anne Hathaway) has gathered her fellow cronies from around the globe—undercover—to carry out her nefarious plans. Roald Dahl's The Witches is directed by iconic American filmmaker Robert Zemeckis, director of many films including Back to the Future, Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Contact, Cast Away, Forrest Gump, The Polar Express, Beowulf, Flight, The Walk, and Allied, plus Welcome to Marwen most recently. Based on the book by Roald Dahl, the screenplay is written by Robert Zemeckis & Kenya Barris (TV's "Black-ish", Shaft) and Oscar winner Guillermo del Toro. Zemeckis is also producing, alongside Jack Rapke, del Toro, Alfonso Cuarón, Luke Kelly. Warner Bros will release Zemeckis' The Witches streaming on HBO Max starting October 22nd later this month. First impression? Who's in?