Director: Veronika Franz, Severin Fiala
Deep in the forests of 18th-century Austria, a young woman's quiet dread grows louder than any spoken word in The Devil's Bath, a 2024 historical horror-drama from Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala.
What is The Devil's Bath about?
Agnes is preparing for married life, surrounded by rituals, chores, and the watchful eyes of a rural community bound tightly by superstition. But beneath the surface of her new household, her mind grows heavier by the day, weighed down by isolation and expectations she cannot voice aloud. The film opens with a stark reminder of the era's brutality: a woman is put to death for the killing of an infant, an act that hangs over the story like a shadow no one dares mention directly. As Agnes drifts further from the people around her, dark thoughts begin creeping into her private moments, and the line between despair and something more dangerous starts to blur. Set against dense woodland and candlelit interiors, the film builds its tension through atmosphere rather than jump scares, letting period detail and silence do most of the unsettling work. Anja Plaschg leads the cast in a performance built on restraint, allowing small gestures to carry the weight of a mind slowly closing in on itself.
Cast & crew
Anja Plaschg carries the film as Agnes, supported by Maria Hofstätter, David Scheid, and Natalija Baranova. Co-directors Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala, known for atmospheric, folklore-inflected horror, shape the performances around stillness and repressed emotion rather than overt drama.
Context & significance
The Devil's Bath is an Austrian-German co-production rooted in documented histories of women in the 1700s who confessed to crimes in order to escape lives of unbearable isolation, framed here as a slow-burn period horror rather than a courtroom drama. Its rural setting and folk-horror atmosphere place it alongside a wider revival of historical horror films exploring mental strain within rigid social structures.
Where & how to watch
The Devil's Bath is available on K-Time with Persian dubbing and Persian subtitles, part of a Farsi-first viewing experience built for the Iranian diaspora. A free K-Time account login is required to stream, though this page can be read without signing in.