Day of Wrath - Criterion Collection

It is a bleak and hopeless period set in a cold and Danish village in 1623 when people without question still believed in the existence of witches and went about on thousands of merciless witch hunts to catch and then burn innocent people at the stake. Many of these villagers would conjure up any fantasy about a friend, lover or neighbor who might or might not be a witch, whether out of hatred, jealously or the very belief that they actually were one. Day of Wrath was directed by the legendary Danish director Carl Theodor Dreyer and like all his films, Day of Wrath deals more about faith and spirituality than the fundamental basics of Christianity.

When Day of Wrath was released and premiered in 1942 it was during the darkest times of the Nazi occupation of Denmark in which several Danes were being taking away and deported to death camps. Even though you could look at this film as a historical document about the naïve, unscientific and irrational times in which people would simply accept and believe in such things as evil spirits, sorcery and witchcraft, when looking at the film at the time it was released it could be viewed more as a commentary or political allegory of the present times. When the film was released many Danes drew parallels between the witch burning and the persecution of Jews during the Nazi Party