The Crucible

The Crucible (1996) is a historical drama starring Daniel Day-Lewis that you can watch online on iFILM. Adapted from Arthur Miller's play, it drops you into a Puritan Massachusetts village late in the 17th century, where a single accusation can put a neighbor on the gallows.

It starts with girls dancing around a fire after dark, brewing a love charm with a servant from Barbados, until the local minister catches them. From there a rumor of devil-worship swells out of control. Abigail Williams, played by Winona Ryder, rides the hysteria to settle a private score: she wants the wife of farmer John Proctor, the man she once shared a bed with, out of the way. Townsfolk start informing on one another, a judge arrives from Boston ready to believe the most absurd charge, and the arrests pile up.

Director Nicholas Hytner filmed it from a screenplay by Miller himself. Decades earlier the playwright wrote the story as a reply to the McCarthy-era purges, and that echo still cuts on screen. A hundred and twenty-four minutes on how fear turns decent people into executioners. Stream The Crucible (1996) online on iFILM.