Woodlands Dark and Days Bewitched: A History of Folk Horror - Review and Criticism 

I recently picked up the Woodlands Dark and Days Bewitched blu-ray boxset Severin Films published- which contains some of the films they discuss in the documentary. Its been a great crash course in Folk Horror film and I agree with many of your points about the doc in your review. I'm super pleased I found your channel discussing this fascinating genre, keep it up!

Omg I'm so glad I found your channel. Your perspective and contributions to the study of folk horror are so valuable.

I think your 3 part series is vastly superior to Woodlands Dark. Your work was more concise, thought out and point by point.The Janisse film runs on too long and relies too much on talking heads with no real conclusion. They might as well titled it a bunch of people involved with making films spout-off about folk horror while we show clips that don't always tie to the subject at hand. It might be a good introduction for someone who has no concept of the genre. Otherwise I would recommend your True History over Woodlands. Keep up the great work.

I stumbled across this documentary late last night on a streaming service, and I’m just about to sit down and watch it. I was already very much looking forward to seeing it, but even more so now, following your review here. Thanks so much for covering what is probably my favorite sub genre of horror, and also I’d like to say that your channel is excellent. Really quality, scholarly examinations of the subject at hand. Cheers!

3:50 Edgar Allan Poe was writing folk horror in the 1860s, long before folk horror films of the 1960s.

Tremendous review my friend you absolutely read my mind with a lot of the points you made. I do think this was an excellent documentary. I appreciated the recommendations that the film provided. I do think the criticisms you made were spot on. The claims about female empowerment and the stuff about 9/11 causing a resurgence I thought were rather forced as well. Keep up the great work my friend I'm new subscriber as of this video.

Very good. I can't find your video of the Murray book, about the witch cult? Please help, thank you!

I also read some ideas Lovecraft had on paganism & folk tales. He did believe it was a political movement. Albeit, not that organized until the XVIII century. Their enemy: feudalism, the king, and the church. It is a well-written report. I read it in the correspondence he had with Robert E. Howard (A Means To Freedom.) I also recommend Victor Erice's The Spirit of the Beehive.

One thing I find very annoying about much analysis of films etc... these days is the insistence of of practically force feeding a somewhat leftist , "progressive" worldview into the mix and proceeding as if that were the final word to be said about it. This review of the Woodlands doc hits on two of the major examples present in the film that I also noticed, "colonialism" and "feminism" both of which are far over used and full of many erroneous assumptions and questionable conclusions even in a general discussion of society and especially as they pertain to informing a film genre like folk horror. Smug political bias is the worst and rears it's ugly head to often where it is not welcome these days. Great review, great channel, carry on the great work.

A bit late to the video but I half heartedly contend that Bram Stokers Dracula should be considered Folk Horror. It seems the requisite components are present in the novel. Western modern man (Modern at the time written anyway) goes to small isolated community and interacts with evil that the locals are aware of, but try to keep hidden.

They also left out films like “ Spirit of the Beehive” which IMO is an essential folk horror drama

Thank you for your passion for, and dedication to, extensive, in depth research.

I adore British Horror and Folk Horror. I have a degree in Film Studies. I watched the documentary you are reviewing here and thought it was a load if rubbish. Apart that is from the film clips that is, which it was mostly comprised of anyway, so you might as well just go and watch the films themselves. The waffle in between by so-called experts was tedious and I learned nothing new. After about half an hour I turned it off, disappointed.

Oh my God! L.G. Clarke Alive talking about His Stories! I am, like, H.P. Lovecraft Level Hero!

Is The Human Centipede (First Sequence) A Folk Horror Film and in this movie? I mean it's rather Folkish like Mad Doctor in Secret Woods Etc.

Thank You it is on Amazon Prime and I am going to watch when this finish! Oh yes! I am on Part 2 now! Marvelous!

Folk horror is a multil-faceted thing, and I found some of the views diminishing of certain aspects of this subject- for example witches being symbols of fear regarding female sexuality and power, and that's that, when there's corruption of innocence, being a misfit, twisting of the nurturing instinct into something evil etc to consider. I too was disappointed that they missed mentioning some of the obvious roots of the genre. But we have your wonderful essay for that! In any case, like most everyone else, I'm left with a few dozen movies and TV shows to hunt down and watch thanks to WDaDB.

Sadly gotta drop watching to avoid 'spoilers' but I wanted to say I really appreciate what you're doing here with the channel

This guy has the best reading voice ✌️

I think you miss the historical connection in literature, film and tv. I think we can't divorce culture from history. I am deeply in favor of historicism. There are many layers in this film and I think it is worth acknowledging the effects of history on all these films. We must remember genre films and theory have nuances that often are broad ,but still very important claims.

I was going to message you a couple of months ago , and ask you if you'd seen this ! I loved it and bought the boxset . Thanks for reviewing it ~

Please watch the Classic Ghost Stories podcast with Tony Walker narrating.

The thing that I found really jarring and quite annoying is that she couldn't seem to settle on a presentation format - its starts with the 'non-narration' approach, just letting the talking-heads do the talking. Its quite annoyuing to me that there is no narrated introduction but thats fine, some docs are better without a narrated intro. Thats fine, whatever. But then she starts narrating it as if she's been doing it for the whole movie which is like 'OK this is jarring and weird.' - BUT THEN there are clips of her as an interviewee talking about the movies - which is really bizarre as you know that she is the filmaker - but she's pretending like she's being interviewed...! Its just really jarring and really annoying. It would've been fine if all these elements were dispersed evenly throughout the 3 hours but they're not. It just really makes the difference between a well-made, cohesive documentary and... a crap one. Shrug.

Have you heard of a 1966 Joan Fontaine film called "The Witches"? I think you would find that it's folk horror or very close to it.

Really enjoying your videos

The fundamental problem that cropped up constantly throughout this documentary was the projecting of the individuals politics into the genre where those politics simply did not exist. This has become a huge issue within our culture at large.

Woodlands Dark And Days Bewitched: A History Of Folk Horror Three Hours of Absolutely Splendid Materiel, 3 h 12 min Explores the folk horror phenomenon and its culturally specific manifestations in international horror, from its first wave in the 1970s to today.

I think it’s interesting that these folk horror films coined as feminist often expect women rejecting society as society has failed them. The fear of status quo being less desirable than the unknown.

Cheers mate. Are you Aussie?

it would've been good if it hadn't started preaching feminism and native power and anti-white guilt. turned into a civil rights documentary. so much sermonizing instead of just focusing on the entertainment value of horror.

The documentary was good, but yeah, the authors trying to use Folk Horror as a mean to give out and reinforce their political views in a genre that's not political per se it's plain propaganda and unnecesary. Folk Horror doesn't need politics, nor has to do with politics (What were the politics behind Machen's The Great God Pan or Buchan's No Man's Land?). Nowadays folklore studies and therefore folk horror is taken by leftist/liberal minds trying to force their ideology into the mass media, not unlike the times when the Völkisch movement tried to use it to push their own ethno-nationalist ideas.