Benjamin Christensen's "Häxan: Witchcraft Through The Ages" (1922) What starts looking like a documentary about the belief in witchcraft and demons in medieval culture goes on to become a much more revealing story, portraying devils and demons consorting with villagers, tormenting nuns and monks, and rites of the witches sabbath. Christensen even gets to play the role of Lucifer in a campy way that could only be taken seriously in a silent movie. This film was actually banned for many years in the US, for graphic violence and sexual perversion. It's kind of hard to imagine nowaday just how shocking it could have been, retrospectively. It would eventually be allowed for viewing in the 60s when a shorter version would be narrated by William S. Burroughs. It even does so far as to associate acceptance of demonic possession as a means of dealing with psychological condition that were just not yet understood. When it comes down to it this movie is pretty darn good even by today's standards.
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