The Real-Life Inspiration For The Witch, This Year's Most Disturbing Horror Film So Far

Of course, there's plenty of material to sift through when it comes to witchcraft in the colonial era, especially in the context of the Salem witch trials. Two very notable figures extensively documented accounts of witchcraft during this time: Cotton Mather and Samuel Willard, who wrote The Wonders of the Invisible World and Groton in Witchcraft Times respectively. The books offer an in-depth look at the persecution of witches in New England at the time, and both were consulted when writing the movie. These men don't appear as characters in the film, but you may remember that Cotton Mather appears as a character on the TV show Salem.