Two of the greatest horror films of all time are celebrating their 100th anniversary this year. The first, and best known, is F.W. Murnau’s unparalleled vampire epic Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror. Not quite as well known but at least as influential is Häxan: Witchcraft Through the Ages, also known as The Witch, a truly unique artifact in the history of horror filmmaking. By calling it an “artifact” I do not mean to imply that it is a dusty old relic. In fact, the film is surprisingly lively, engaging, and perhaps above all, subversive.
Danish director Benjamin Christensen presents Häxan under the guise of a teaching tool, a filmic lecture on the history of witchcraft, but this is something of a ruse. By wrapping his intentions within this format, Christensen was able to frankly and graphically depict some of the most taboo subjects and images of the age. Today, it might be called an “essay film,” a kind of pseudo-documentary with reenactments, a thesis, and a definite point of view. Though it remains quite neutral at first, the film’s biases become more and more clear as it unspools. The first act of the film is primarily ancient drawings and woodcuts laying out beliefs about the cosmos, good and evil, gods, hell, the devil, and witches from ancient Persia and Egypt to the Middle Ages in Europe. This section serves as an overview for the entire film which, starting with the second act, primarily plays out in reenactments based upon these images and the ideas they present.
This opening sequence is not so far removed from what may be seen in documentaries by The History Channel or Ken Burns, but these conventions were essentially invented by Christensen in this film. They lull the audience in with familiar and relatively safe artistic representations of sometimes horrifying events. Christensen then brings these images to life with actors in period costume on sets meticulously designed and built down to the tiniest detail to match the medieval setting of a witch’s home in 1488. Here, we find an old woman stirring a pot hanging over a fire. Others enter carrying various bundles including one that contains the severed arm of a hanged thief and another holding frogs and snakes, all of which will be added to the potion on the fire.
This is only the gateway to the transgressive subjects that Häxan will explore. Soon after, two grave robbers enter and unveil a corpse they intend to dissect for anatomical research, which was considered an act of witchcraft in the time depicted. Throughout the course of the film, Christensen presents a number of images that were considered too strong for many audiences throughout the world in 1922. Indeed, the film faced a great deal of censorship in Germany, England, the United States, and just about everywhere else it was shown outside of Christensen’s native Denmark and Sweden where the film was financed. Among these images are two women urinating in buckets and throwing the contents against the door of a person they wish to curse, unmistakable masturbatory imagery of the Devil (played by Christensen himself) at a butter churn, nudity, images of torture, possessed nuns, flagellation of a monk with clear sado-masochistic overtones, spitting on a wood carving of the child Jesus, and desecration of the communion host believed in some religious dogmas to be the body of Christ.
Most transgressive of all is the extended sequence of the Witch’s Sabbath. The sequence is presented as the confession, under torture, of an old woman accused of witchcraft by a corrupt and superstitious inquisition of monks. In it, she discusses much of what Christensen presented in the first act, but here it is presented not through artist renditions, graphic reenactment. The sequence includes a group of women treading and dancing upon a cross on the ground, the blood sacrifice of a baby, sex with demons, and the kissing of the Devil’s backside in a declaration of devotion to him. The sequence is filled with nudity, sexual imagery, demons, and various forms of debauchery that remain potent even one hundred years later. This dreamlike sequence is the most famous section of the film, the one that has had the most direct influence on film history. Its fingerprints can clearly be seen on films as diverse as the “Night on Bald Mountain” scene of Walt Disney’s Fantasia (1940) and Rosemary’s Baby (1968).
In order to make its points, Häxan also utilizes a number of impressive technical elements. Through extensive use of puppetry, stop motion, reverse photography, and superimposition, Christensen depicts witches flying on broomsticks, a demon tearing its way through a door, the seduction of greed and power through wealth with dancing coins, and much more. The makeup effects of the demons are also incredibly impressive, particularly for the time, and are presented as full body costumes and masks. Not to be ignored are the photographic effects from cinematographer Johan Ankerstjerne who invented a number of techniques that continued to be used for decades to make the witches fly through the darkened skies and over fantastical landscapes. All these elements together produce an indelible mood that is both artistic and creepy, but in a way that differentiates it from the German Expressionist movement that at the time was defined by Robert Weine’s The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, Paul Wegener’s The Golem: How He Came Into the World, and F.W. Murnau’s Nosferatu.
As becomes clear throughout the course of the film, Häxan is a call to enlightenment, an admonition to rise above superstition and look upon humanity with reasoned compassion. The film is not necessarily an indictment of various religious practices themselves, such as admonitions to love others and better oneself. But it certainly indicts those practices driven by misuses of religion that harm, demean, and destroy others. In our modern age, this takes many forms, maybe the most disturbing modern form of superstition being conspiracy theorizing which has led to threats of various kinds, endangerment, and sometimes even violence and death to those found in the crosshairs, sometimes literally, of a conspiracy theorist. Häxan is a stark reminder that perhaps we are not quite so enlightened as we think we are.
The last section of the film focuses on mental illness, concluding that many who suffer from what the film calls “hysteria” would have been condemned as witches in the Middle Ages. Those persecuted by the church in 1488 are persecuted by the Law in 1922. Old age, ailment, disability, and mental illness were all seen as afflictions from the devil. Even today in some circles, they still are. The film goes so far as to argue that the institutionalization of the mentally ill and the hydrotherapies popular at the time were akin to burning witches at the stake. The film ends with the image of a woman undergoing a tepid hydro-therapeutic shower slowly fading to three bodies being consumed by flames. It is powerful imagery, though it is quite a stretch to compare the two. In reality, however, even today, mental illness, along with old age, physical disabilities, and disease, are still met with fear and discrimination. Though they are less often seen as afflictions from the devil, they are viewed by too many as afflictions of nature. This is truly a sad state of affairs. There have certainly been great strides in the past one hundred years to improve this, but it is also clear that we have a great deal further to go. That argument is at the heart of Häxan.
As the closing titles implore us to consider, “centuries have passed, and the Almighty of medieval times no longer sits in his tenth sphere. We no longer sit terrified in church, staring at frescoes of devils. The witch no longer flies away on her broom over the rooftops. But isn’t superstition still rampant among us?” Yet another century has passed since these words were first exhibited to audiences and they remain as true as ever. This is clear in minor ways, such as the many superstitions surrounding sports, daily horoscopes printed in newspapers and posted online, and any number of other innocuous fashions. But it also presents itself in more nefarious ways that are deep seated in human nature and in the pervasive fear of “the other”—surely a theme that has permeated the entire horror genre for the more than a century of its existence on film. Films like Häxan confront us with these realities and demand that we examine ourselves. They are more than mere entertainments, they are calls to action. Just another way that Häxan has proven its influence.
The tendrils of Häxan reach through the ages from F.W. Murnau’s Faust (1926) to Michael Reeves’ Witchfinder General (1968); from Ken Russell’s The Devils (1971) and William Friedkin’s The Exorcist (1973) to Robert Eggers’ The Witch (2015) and Phil Tippett’s Mad God (2022). There is hardly a horror film with some kind of religious element, be it The Wicker Man (1973), The Conjuring (2013), or even Onibaba (1964) or The Vigil (2019) that does not at least in some way feel its influence. It is also one of the few silent films that does not feel dated in its subject, imagery, and performances. It is remarkably compelling now in its hundredth year, though its influence has made it less shocking as we have seen many of its most transgressive elements crop up in various films throughout the decades. But still, its call to throw off the shackles of superstition in whatever forms they take and treat our fellow humans with dignity and compassion is a message that is as true and potent now as it was one hundred years ago. Just as Christensen in 1922 and we today look upon the events depicted in Häxan as horrifying, I have no doubt that future generations will look upon our modern superstitious practices, in the various forms they take, and the witch hunts connected with them in their modern guises, and shudder.
In Bride of Frankenstein, Dr. Pretorius, played by the inimitable Ernest Thesiger, raises his glass and proposes a toast to Colin Clive’s Henry Frankenstein—“to a new world of Gods and Monsters.” I invite you to join me in exploring this world, focusing on horror films from the dawn of the Universal Monster movies in 1931 to the collapse of the studio system and the rise of the new Hollywood rebels in the late 1960’s. With this period as our focus, and occasional ventures beyond, we will explore this magnificent world of classic horror. So, I raise my glass to you and invite you to join me in the toast.
The post The World, the Flesh, and the Devil: ‘Häxan-Witchcraft Through the Ages’ at 100 [Gods and Monsters] appeared first on Bloody Disgusting!.