Häxan: Witchcraft Through the Ages
By Clive Python | 14jammar
Only 20's kids will remember 1922; what a time to be alive! While there were films made before 1922, none other
was more ambitious than Häxan: Witchcraft Through the Ages.
This was director Benjamin Christensen's third movie, with a budget
costing nearly two million Swedish kronor it was the most expensive
Scandinavian silent film ever made. The movie shows basic camera
technics such as playing film backwards and overlaying film.
Due to the fact that the original copyright holder failed to
renew its copyright, this now means that it is in the Public
Domain - meaning that anyone can duplicate and sell copies of
the film. Becuase of this, you should look it up online!
Häxan is quite often than not overlooked by Nosferatu that came out in the same year. The movie is split into four parts;
The first part of the movie starts off with showing a short history of demons
and witches in primitive and medieval culture. The movie goes on and tells the
viewer of what past cultures believed about the order of the world (i.e. God and the like).
Part II is really where the film starts to get crazy. The movie shows a sleeping woman
who is soon tempted by Satan (played by the director) who soon makes the woman go away
from her husband's bed and terrorises a group of monks.
A woman, who is thought to be a witch is put on trial and is tortured until she confesses her crimes.
The last part of the movie is very interesting as it shows medieval methods of
torture like the the thumbscrew,
The Breast Ripper and other grizzly devices.
This is part of the movie that is most down to Earth, not only
does it not deal with fantasy but it also goes out of its way
to inform the viewer that one of the reasons why many women
were mistaken for witches and then killed was because of
ignorance such as religion.
An example of this would be that the movie tells of how nuns
would use some torture devices on their self - such as a belt
that had spikes on the inside to get closer to God.
The movie has been heavily censored in some countries and even banned
in The United States for what was considered at the time to be graphic
depictions of torture, nudity (the most you see is a woman's bottom)
and sexual acts. Compared to newer movies such as Saw and The Human
Centipede the movie is very tame.
When the film was re-released in Demark in 1941, Benjamin Christensen
considered removing the modern-day sequences from the film. Inevitably,
the film was released with the modern scenes intact.
On a personal level, I think that Häxan should be
reclassified as 12A. The guidelines for a 12A movie are;
What do you think? Should the movie be reclassified or should it stay an 18?
The movie was cut from 104 minutes to 77 minutes. This version of the
movie may (or may not) be public domain.
I.
British Board of Film Classification - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Board_of_Film_Classification#Current_certificates [Internet Archive, archive.is]
II.
Movies I Like - 14jammar (Archive of OwlMan's old site)
https://owlman.neocities.org/14jammar/Movies.html [Internet Archive, archive.is]
III.
Häxan - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H%C3%A4xan [archive.is]
IV.
Watch/download Häxan - Internet Archive
https://archive.org/details/Haxan_tinted_and_subtitled
V.
Häxan - IMDb
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0013257/?ref_=fn_tt_tt_1 [archive.is]
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0013257/trivia?ref_=tt_trv_trv [Internet Archive, archive.is]
VI.
Haxan: Witchcraft Through the Ages Recolour - 14jammar
https://owlman.neocities.org/library/img/haxan/hwcttarecolour_14jammar.png [Internet Archive, archive.is]
Written by Clive "James" Python, 29/04/17.
https://owlman.neocities.org/library/haxan.html
https://web.archive.org/web/*/https://owlman.neocities.org/library/haxan.html
I will be talking about plot points in the movie, so spoilers.
Part I
Part II
Part III
Part IV
Recuts
Despite how tame the movie is, in the UK the movie is still classed as an 18.
May contain mature themes, discrimination, soft drugs,
moderate language, moderate violence, sex references and
nudity. Sexual activity may be briefly and discreetly
portrayed. Use of strong language may be permitted based on
frequency and how they are used, as well as contextual
justification. Sexual violence may be implied or briefly indicated.
1968 Recut
in 1968 America, an abbreviated version of the film was released, called
"Witchcraft Through the Ages". It was narrated by William S. Burroughs
and had a horrible jazz score by Daniel Humair
References
