Director Benjamin Christensen’s home country of Denmark was one of the few places on Earth that DIDN’T censor his bizarre cinematic essay about the history of witchcraft paranoia and persecution in the Christian world. Everyone else cut out the naked women. Or the brief suggestions of torture. Or the human body parts and dead babies tossed into cauldrons of magic brew. Or the (today, fairly funny) scene in which a woman gives birth to demons.
The film switches off between documentary sequences and dramatizations, with a uniquely intimate tone for its time. Christensen sometimes speaks directly to us, writing the title cards in the first-person, sharing some of his own thoughts and even offering a few quick, relevant anecdotes about the production and his actors during the course of the film. In fact, the very first thing we see in the movie is Christensen introducing himself. He also takes two pointed acting roles here: Satan in a horned costume and a crucified Jesus Christ.
Haxan fell in and out of circulation over the decades, turning up here and there in chopped-up versions, and always earning reviews that praised its artistry along with reviews that attacked its perceived depravity. The most famous alternate version is the one from 1968—a time when the acid-eating counterculture was hungry for bizarre old films—with William S. Burroughs narrating over a hip jazz score.