# The Witches (1966 film)
**The Witches** is a 1966 British horror film directed by Cyril Frankel, written by [Nigel Kneale](https://www.edgepedia.org/nigel-kneale), and starring [Joan Fontaine](https://www.edgepedia.org/joan-fontaine) in her final big-screen appearance, as a schoolteacher who recovers from a breakdown caused by witchcraft in Africa only to find a coven operating in the English village where she takes a new teaching post.[1](https://www.bfi.org.uk/film/c9849814-bf8b-51a8-855d-bbc753c7469c/the-witches) • [2](https://player.bfi.org.uk/rentals/film/watch-the-witches-1966-online) It was produced by [Hammer Film Productions](https://www.edgepedia.org/hammer-film-productions) in a Seven Arts-Hammer production and released in the United States under the title **The Devil's Own**.[3](https://www.hammer-graveyard.org.uk/cinema-releases-1960s/the-witches/)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Director / writer | Cyril Frankel; screenplay by Nigel Kneale, creator of Quatermass[1](https://www.bfi.org.uk/film/c9849814-bf8b-51a8-855d-bbc753c7469c/the-witches) |
| Source | The novel *The Devil's Own* by Norah Lofts, published under the pseudonym Peter Curtis[4](https://www.spookyisles.com/the-witches-1966/) |
| Stars | Joan Fontaine (Gwen Mayfield), Kay Walsh, Alec McCowen[1](https://www.bfi.org.uk/film/c9849814-bf8b-51a8-855d-bbc753c7469c/the-witches) |
| Release | London premiere 21 November 1966; UK general release 9 December 1966; US limited release 1 February 1967 as *The Devil's Own*[5](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060307/releaseinfo/) |
| Production | Filmed 18 April to 10 June 1966 at Bray Studios, Berkshire, with village exteriors in Hambleden, Buckinghamshire; Technicolor, 91 minutes[3](https://www.hammer-graveyard.org.uk/cinema-releases-1960s/the-witches/) |
| Music and photography | Score by Richard Rodney Bennett; cinematography by Arthur Grant[6](https://sede.mcu.gob.es/CatalogoICAA/Peliculas/Detalle?Pelicula=7226140) |
| Genre standing | An early entry in the folk horror subgenre, preceding *The Wicker Man* (1973)[7](https://bloody-disgusting.com/editorials/3694938/witches-put-academy-award-winning-actress-dark-arts-hammer-factory/) |
## Spoilers
### Plot
Gwen Mayfield (Joan Fontaine) is an English schoolteacher working as a missionary in Africa who suffers a nervous breakdown after being victimized by local witch doctors.[8](https://www.primevideo.com/detail/0HR0H8X1SZ2KRC47TGTGJYB7ZX) To recover, she accepts a teaching job in the fictional village of Heddaby, where she is welcomed by the villagers.[3](https://www.hammer-graveyard.org.uk/cinema-releases-1960s/the-witches/)
The mystery builds from the town's panic around a romance between two adolescents, escalating through voodoo dolls and murder.[9](https://scottsmoviereviews.com/the-witches-1966/) When Gwen discovers an image of a boy stuck full of pins, she comes to suspect that the villagers' interest in the girl Linda's purity is about more than disapproval, and her investigation leads to a confrontation with the cult's leader, Stephanie Bax (Kay Walsh).[10](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1091257-witches) The film culminates in a ceremony at which the coven plans to sacrifice one of Gwen's students, and Gwen thwarts the ritual at the last moment.[9](https://scottsmoviereviews.com/the-witches-1966/)
## Production
**Origin of the project.** Joan Fontaine spearheaded the production: she discovered Norah Lofts' novel *The Devil's Own*, bought the film rights, and brought the project to Hammer Films for adaptation.[9](https://scottsmoviereviews.com/the-witches-1966/) • [4](https://www.spookyisles.com/the-witches-1966/) Fontaine, who had made her name as the second Mrs de Wynter in [Alfred Hitchcock](https://www.edgepedia.org/alfred-hitchcock)'s *[Rebecca](https://www.edgepedia.org/rebecca-1940-film)* (1940) and won a Best Actress Oscar for *Suspicion* (1941), was an unusual acquisition for the studio, which had previously attracted aging Hollywood stars such as [Bette Davis](https://www.edgepedia.org/bette-davis) in *The Nanny* (1965).[3](https://www.hammer-graveyard.org.uk/cinema-releases-1960s/the-witches/) • [7](https://bloody-disgusting.com/editorials/3694938/witches-put-academy-award-winning-actress-dark-arts-hammer-factory/)
The screenplay was adapted by Nigel Kneale, the writer behind *The Quatermass Experiment*.[2](https://player.bfi.org.uk/rentals/film/watch-the-witches-1966-online) According to the BFI, Kneale was unhappy with the finished film, which he felt disregarded his humorous intentions in favor of a more conventional approach.[2](https://player.bfi.org.uk/rentals/film/watch-the-witches-1966-online)
**Shooting.** The film was shot between 18 April and 10 June 1966. Interiors were filmed at Bray Studios, Down Place, Oakley Green, Berkshire, the same year Hammer left Bray for Elstree and Pinewood, while the village exteriors for Heddaby were filmed in [Hambleden](https://www.edgepedia.org/hambleden), Buckinghamshire.[3](https://www.hammer-graveyard.org.uk/cinema-releases-1960s/the-witches/) • [4](https://www.spookyisles.com/the-witches-1966/) The production was presented by Associated British Pathe and released through Warner-Pathe in the UK and Twentieth Century Fox in the USA.[3](https://www.hammer-graveyard.org.uk/cinema-releases-1960s/the-witches/)
## Release and reception
The film premiered in London on 21 November 1966, went into general UK release on 9 December 1966, and opened in the United States in limited release on 1 February 1967 under the title *The Devil's Own*.[5](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060307/releaseinfo/) The British Board of Film Censors certified it "X" in 1966.[3](https://www.hammer-graveyard.org.uk/cinema-releases-1960s/the-witches/)
Contemporary and later assessments have been mixed. Reviewers credit Fontaine with carrying the film and note Kay Walsh's performance as Gwen's most trusted confidant in a town where every allegiance becomes questionable.[9](https://scottsmoviereviews.com/the-witches-1966/) Recurring criticisms concern the final act: the ritual sequence has been described as goofy and anti-climactic, with the villains failing to treat the heroine as a threat.[9](https://scottsmoviereviews.com/the-witches-1966/) The film holds an IMDb rating of 5.8/10.[8](https://www.primevideo.com/detail/0HR0H8X1SZ2KRC47TGTGJYB7ZX)
**Fontaine's last film.** *The Witches* was Joan Fontaine's final big-screen appearance; sources attribute the end of her film career to the film's poor box office performance, although she continued to appear on television.[2](https://player.bfi.org.uk/rentals/film/watch-the-witches-1966-online) • [4](https://www.spookyisles.com/the-witches-1966/) • [11](https://nostalgiacentral.com/movies/movies-l-to-z/movies-w/witches-the-1966/)
## Place in folk horror
*The Witches* is identified as an early entry in the folk horror subgenre, the British tradition of rural, ritual-based horror that later produced *The Wicker Man* (1973).[7](https://bloody-disgusting.com/editorials/3694938/witches-put-academy-award-winning-actress-dark-arts-hammer-factory/) Academic work on the subgenre notes that the film portrays tensions between surviving village lore and invented faux-ancient practices, demonstrating folk horror's links with folkloristics.[12](https://openurl.ebsco.com/contentitem/gcd%3A138834098?id=ebsco%3Agcd%3A138834098&sid=ebsco%3Aplink%3Acrawler) Another study describes it as anticipating the themes of *The Wicker Man*.[13](https://e-space.mmu.ac.uk/622558/1/Witches%20Bitches%20Revenant.pdf)
The film occupies an awkward position in Hammer's catalog. It uses none of the studio's regular directors or stars, and it falls in line with the "outsider at the mercy of a secret cult" genre later revolutionized by *Rosemary's Baby* and *The Wicker Man*, which has left it a lesser-viewed entry in Hammer's filmography.[2](https://player.bfi.org.uk/rentals/film/watch-the-witches-1966-online) • [14](https://dailygrindhouse.com/thewire/the-witches/) It has also been overshadowed by Hammer's later occult horror *The Devil Rides Out* (1968).[4](https://www.spookyisles.com/the-witches-1966/) The BFI describes it as one of Hammer's most overlooked films, while noting that a sense of dark satire is visible in the film today, making it, in the BFI's words, ripe for rediscovery.[2](https://player.bfi.org.uk/rentals/film/watch-the-witches-1966-online) A Scream Factory Blu-ray release brought the film to the format for the first time.[14](https://dailygrindhouse.com/thewire/the-witches/)
## Note on other films of the same era
The title is easily confused with two other mid-1960s European films. *The Witch* (1966), directed by Damiano Damiani, is an Italian horror film starring Rosanna Schiaffino and Richard Johnson about a general's widow who tempts a palace historian.[15](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/witch_1966) *Le streghe* (The Witches, 1967) is an Italian anthology film directed in part by [Vittorio De Sica](https://www.edgepedia.org/vittorio-de-sica), Pier Paolo Pasolini, and [Luchino Visconti](https://www.edgepedia.org/luchino-visconti), starring [Silvana Mangano](https://www.edgepedia.org/silvana-mangano).[16](https://cineuropa.org/en/film/414583/) Neither is related to the Hammer production.
## References
1. [The Witches (1966), British Film Institute](https://www.bfi.org.uk/film/c9849814-bf8b-51a8-855d-bbc753c7469c/the-witches)
2. [Watch The Witches online, BFI Player](https://player.bfi.org.uk/rentals/film/watch-the-witches-1966-online)
3. [The Witches, The Hammer Graveyard](https://www.hammer-graveyard.org.uk/cinema-releases-1960s/the-witches/)
4. [The Witches 1966 REVIEW, Spooky Isles (Adam Scovell)](https://www.spookyisles.com/the-witches-1966/)
5. [The Witches (1966) Release info, IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060307/releaseinfo/)
6. [ICAA Film Data: Brujas, Las, Spanish Ministry of Culture](https://sede.mcu.gob.es/CatalogoICAA/Peliculas/Detalle?Pelicula=7226140)
7. [The Witches Put an Academy Award Winning Actress Up Against the Dark Arts, Bloody Disgusting](https://bloody-disgusting.com/editorials/3694938/witches-put-academy-award-winning-actress-dark-arts-hammer-factory/)
8. [The Witches, Prime Video](https://www.primevideo.com/detail/0HR0H8X1SZ2KRC47TGTGJYB7ZX)
9. [The Witches (1966), Scott's Movie Reviews](https://scottsmoviereviews.com/the-witches-1966/)
10. [The Devil's Own, Rotten Tomatoes](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1091257-witches)
11. [Witches, The (1966), Nostalgia Central](https://nostalgiacentral.com/movies/movies-l-to-z/movies-w/witches-the-1966/)
12. ["Practicing Witchcraft Myself During the Filming": Folk Horror, Folklore, and the Folkloresque, EBSCOhost](https://openurl.ebsco.com/contentitem/gcd%3A138834098?id=ebsco%3Agcd%3A138834098&sid=ebsco%3Aplink%3Acrawler)
13. [Witches, Bitches, Revenant journal (Manchester Metropolitan University)](https://e-space.mmu.ac.uk/622558/1/Witches%20Bitches%20Revenant.pdf)
14. [Scream Factory brings THE WITCHES to Blu-ray, Daily Grindhouse](https://dailygrindhouse.com/thewire/the-witches/)
15. [The Witch (1966), Rotten Tomatoes](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/witch_1966)
16. [The Witches (Le streghe), Cineuropa](https://cineuropa.org/en/film/414583/)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Horror films (individual works) › Folk horror films*
*Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 15, 2026; Oct 21, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*
License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license