Folk Horror

Magical-ritualistic practices, ceremonies intended to perpetuate or revisit ancestral folk religions, and obscure beliefs born of traditions lost in time constitute the archetypical features of folk horror, a fascinating cinematic subgenre that attempts to exploit the evocative potential inherent in the ethnic/folkloristic element which is invariably cloaked in an aura of sacredness and associated with the concept of "purity of the origins".

These stories are frequently focused on the activities of geographically and culturally isolated communities living in close contact with nature, which is viewed as a privileged means of communicating with the divine, or even as an expression of the divine itself. In this regard, it's the rural setting that best lends itself to this subgenre, as it's the single most suitable backdrop for vividly depicting tenets of a (neo)pagan nature — after all, "pagan" derives from the Latin "pāgus" (= "small unit of land in a rural district"). "Paganus" thus became a demeaning Latin term for "villager", "rustic", "hick", etc. Later, the word's meaning further shifted until "pagan" began to designate those who took part in pre-Christian religions.

Among the most frequently seen ingredients of this subgenre, we would also cite the penchant for religious syncretism, the presence of pantheistic and/or panentheistic conceptions of reality, and the potential emphasis placed on the theurgic aspect, which can also occur through the intrusion of a supernatural component (the "Witchcraft" Tag may also apply in such cases). Finally, given that folk horror is distinctly connected with socio-anthropological milieus suffused with violence and mental imbalance, this Tag will often be applied alongside others, such as, for example, "Splatter" or "Madness".