I Married A Witch (1942)

SPOILERS AHEAD

Before Bewitched, before Sabrina, and before Practical Magic, there was I Married a Witch. Starring the film noir queen Veronica Lake as Jennifer, a centuries-old witch hellbent on revenge, this film is not only a whimsical fantasy but also a surprisingly sharp commentary on gender, power, and desire - served up with a delicious side of revenge plot.

Released during the height of World War II, I Married a Witch dared to blend supernatural themes with screwball comedy and romance in a way that hadn't really been seen before. It predated the television-era housewife witch trope by decades, and instead of domesticating Jennifer, it let her be fully herself: powerful, sensual, and angry.

The film’s entire premise - that Jennifer and her warlock father are burned at the stake in Puritan New England and return centuries later to torment the descendant of their persecutor - is laced with satire about puritanical morals, patriarchal legacies, and hypocrisy. And while it wears its humor lightly, it's unmistakably clever in how it critiques rigid social norms, especially around women’s roles.

This is a true prototype for the modern day rom-com and it’s almost hard to believe it was made in the 40s - exemplifying how ahead of it’s time it truly was. Long before Meg Ryan and Julia Roberts ruled the silver screen, Veronica Lake gave us a love story powered by chemistry, chaos, and comedy. Watching Jennifer fall in love with Wallace Wooley (played by Fredric March), despite her best intentions to curse him, gives the film its irresistible tension.

Jennifer isn't the demure, doe-eyed woman waiting to be loved, countering the damsel in distress trope of the times - she’s the instigator, the spellcaster, the one flipping the script. She drinks her own love potion by accident, and her resulting vulnerability and rage at being undone by emotion gives the film a uniquely female-centered heart. (Completely relatable to women of the modern age…)

Jennifer might be laughing, smiling, and looking ethereal with her signature blonde waves, but beneath, her rage simmers. Not just personal rage at being burned at the stake, but ancestral rage - the kind that knows how long women have been punished for power, blamed for misfortune, and told to stay in line. Her rebellion is comical - a choice made to add lightheartedness to the film OR a creative choice to portray how female rage is perceived by the patriarchy? She refuses to be silenced, refuses to disappear, and refuses to play by the rules - showing the unrelenting (and sometimes unpredictable) persistence of women. In a genre that would often ask women to shrink, I Married a Witch lets its heroine lead and is arguably one of the earliest and best examples of female rage portrayed in film.

I Married a Witch is more than a charming vintage film—it stands as a reminder that even in the 1940s, there were stories of women owning their power, challenging conventions, and refusing to be defined by the men around them. It’s funny, it’s feminist (even if unintentionally), and it’s fun.