THIS PAGE IS CURRENTLY UNFINISHED BTW - What is Häxan?

Häxan (Swedish word for "Witch") is a 1922 silent documentary about the history of witchcraft, it is a seven part film that spans multiple centuries, and is just generally one of the most ambitious films of the decade, and (in my opinion) still holds up incredibly well to this day regardless of age.

Plot

As I said, the plot takes place over seven different parts, each progressing from the Egyptian times, all the way to modern day (circa 1922, that is).

The first part doesn't have a fictional story, instead it places all focus on the educational aspect of the documentary, simply teaching the viewer how different cultures viewed witchcraft and the world as a whole, such as how the Egyptians thought the curvature of the Earth worked. We see the fear of religion through the perspective of a person from the middle ages and how they would have feared the devil and his servants to set up the fear that would surround witches before jumping to the middle ages to view the witches in action.

Part Two is a series of vignettes, with a specific focus on Satan, who was played by Benjamin Christianson, the director of the film. He strangles and lures women to their windows, and presents greedy women with piles of gold that they are unable to pick up, as the film made use of reverse projection to have them fly up off the screen.

Parts Three to Five are used to show the suspicion of the everyday and how supposed "witches" were treated, with characters coming after an older woman named Maria after the man of the household died from a mysterious disease. We can see how witches as a concept were generally used as a scapegoat for the realities that science was unable to explain yet, with mysterious diseases, unnaturally harsh weather or poor crops needing someone to blame and be killed, in the hopes of increasing the morale of the local people.

Part 6 instead focuses more on the torture of the suspected witches, and how they would have been treated once in custody of the church. Due to its time of release still being quite religious, the film is careful not to deny the existence of the devil but very much does deny the existence of witches. We see the torture methods that would have been used as an explanation as to why people of the time admitted to being something they weren't. He even shows himself (consentually and carefully) using the thumb screw on one of the real actors of the film, and says "I won't disclose the words I was able to get out of this young lady in under a minute" to express just how convincing and harsh the medieval methods of torture were.

The seventh and final part of the film is in my opinion, the most interesting. It showcases the "modern day" and how women are still treated in the time period, with witchcraft no longer being the scapegoat, but rather how women with mental illnesses such as hysteria (we dont use that term anymore btw cause its super vague, but it covers stuff like schizophrenia) are treated similarly to the witches, being pushed out of society and forced into clinics and madhouses. Christianson specifically makes comparisons between the supposed symptoms of witchcraft, and the symptoms of the many mental illnesses that were covered under "hysteria" as a way of explaining what witches actually were, such as women seeing famous figures walk into their room whilst they are sleeping, such as actors or musicians, which was commonly seen in women who suffered from hysteria. Now obviously, "bewitched" women would see the devil do the same, and weren't religious figures the celebrities of their day? One of the most damning pieces of evidence is blind spots on a woman's back, where areas along the spine have no nerves at all, and can't feel a thing when touched. This was cited as a symptom of witches at the time due to it being commonly seen in women who had received visions, and funnily enough - its also a real world symptom of hysteria in the modern day. The film ends with a fictional character in 1922 being sent into a clinic, with the line "But isn't superstition still rampant among us?", ending with the clinic fading into a shot of women burning at the stake, to imply that despite our methods being less brutal, we haven't changed our treatment of the mentally ill as much as we might like to believe.

Cinematography

Besides the story, another element of Häxan that I love is its cinematography. The film makes use of filters to help the black and white visuals pop, and commonly sees frame layouts that replicate the painted works of the middle ages, the whole thing feels like a nightmare that takes place inside a renaissance painting. Tons of frames from the movie are gorgeous in a way that no other movie I've seen has been able to do.

Special Effects

Why I Love It So Much

Cut Comparison