The Devil’s Bath (2024) [Movie review]

The Devil’s Bath proves why Austrian folk horror is entrenched in us as kids. Well, those of us that get Central European Fairy Tales instead of Disney pablum as a child. You don’t get that same impact with modern tales. There’s something about remote people having to deal with things beyond their means and trying to make it work in a polite society. It never goes well, but the filmed results of their collapse are always a treat.

Religion makes for the best horror tales

Religious upbringings always make for weird experiences. If you have a problem with that statement, you live an unexamined life. It’s not a very Christian village we encounter in The Devil’s Bath. It’s a more backwards and barbaric forest culture of fish mongers and gruff types. Where women are bound by rules formed long before their birth that will only serve to break them down. Animals are tortured, dead bodies are turned into ornaments and the gruesome nature of life and death abound everywhere.

Speak when spoken to or else

Agnes and Wolf are your typical rural couple of yesteryear. She wants to get married and have a partner. Wolf and his awful mother stare down Agnes and remind her that marriage is for life. The titular Devil’s Bath is a metaphor for Depression. It washes over you and pushes into the grave that will always be your destiny. However, as Catholic and related religious beliefs push deeper into the forest, the locals get wild. They pray at the drop of a hat and no woman ever feels like she’s independent. Not in the modern sense, but more like you can deny your husband and not get beaten to death.

A constant image throughout the movie is seeing how much death permeates the village. Everything from downfallen women to dead fish soaks into every aspect of life. Ritualistic behaviors take over, as formerly sane people do their best to keep things going. But, when the world is naturally against them…why bother? It’s insane to contemplate this older Sophie’s Choice, but damn if The Devil’s Bath doesn’t beat you down with it.

Women going crazy as old as time itself

Agnes is a good person living a wretched life. When she starts to mentally collapse, you feel bad for her until she starts dragging others down with her. While I’m familiar with the directing team from their work on Goodnight, Mommy…The Devil’s Bath feels much crueler. I fully expect casual movie fans to be really confused by the movie. It doesn’t do much to break up some of its scenes or to make a ton of its dialogue clear. As much atmosphere that permeates The Devil’s Bath, nobody really goes out of their way to hold your hand.

Some people might need that, as the heavy fog of depression batters every aspect of the movie. The weight of not being able to escape a world like this might be too much for sensitive viewers.

It’s an interesting film to release in 2024

There’s something about The Devil’s Bath that got my attention. Mainly the fact it would take a foreign release to make Western audiences come face-to-face with the crippling power of depressive collapse. Intangible mental states are hard to pin down on film, but there’s never a moment in The Devil’s Bath that doesn’t beat you down. Honestly, it seems to be playing like a recent trend with foreign films on Shudder.

This never-ending desire to have foreign films that make you feel like garbage. Some people will dig it. Honestly, I just want to know why we can’t get a good Wolf Man movie anymore.

The Devil’s Bath is now in theaters and will start streaming on Shudder on June 28th