Haxan belongs to the category of black and white silent films released in 1922. The director of Haxan was Benjamin Christensen and it is a Swedish/ Danish film. The film has been made in the documentary format involving witchcraft. Even though it is a documentary film, it has been categorized into horror/thriller movies because there are certain events that have been dramatized in order to make it look scary. The actors in Haxan are Benjamin Christensen, Oscar Stribolt, Maren Pedersen, Astrid Holm and Clara Pontoppidan. The film has a very important message associated with it. This film shows how superstition and witchcraft causes many ill conceived notions and at times mental illnesses.
The film Haxan has been divided into four parts. Each part has been well developed in order to send out the message of the film clearly. The plot of the film has been developed in the first and second part. In the first part of Haxan, there are demons and witches portrayed with the aid of photographs and other equipments. The depiction of Hell too is in the first part of the film. The second part of the film is where one can see the portrayal of Satan that is played by Benjamin Christensen.
Satan is shown to tempt a woman and scare away monks. The third part of the film has several parts with a long narrative.
This part of the film is set in the middle ages. A woman is accused of being a witch in the third part of Haxan. After being held as witch the old woman is tortured to death. Unable to bear the torture, the old woman agrees to be the witch. On close investigation, it is seen that the woman in the house had been wrongly accusing the old woman as witch. She is then arrested. In the last part of the film, the director establishes the fact that in most cases, those who were accused of witchcraft were not mentally sound. In fact diseases like kleptomaniac and somnambulism too were associated with witchcraft as has been depicted in Haxan.
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The trouble faced by those who were mentally unsound is highlighted in this film. Instead of treating people of psychological problem, they are thought to be witches. They were condemned and tortured to death. Haxan has successfully managed to look into the matter and has been a breakthrough in those days. The film was shot during night in order to create eeriness about the film. The background score of Haxan was composed by Launy Grondahl.
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