The Blood on Satan's Claw, originally released as Satan's Skin, is a 1971 British period supernatural horror film directed by Piers Haggard and starring Patrick Wymark, Linda Hayden, and Barry Andrews. Set in early 18th-century England, it follows the residents of a rural village whose youth fall under the influence of a demonic presence after a local farmer unearths a mysterious deformed skull buried in a field. It is widely regarded as one of three films that introduced the folk horror aesthetic to British cinema, an "unholy trinity" whose other entries are Witchfinder General (1968) and The Wicker Man (1973).
The screenplay for the film was originally written by Robert Wynne-Simmons as an anthology of horror stories set in a small village, and had the working title of The Devil's Skin. After director Haggard was hired for the project, he and Wynne-Simmons reworked the screenplay into a single cohesive narrative. Principal photography took place in 1970, mainly in the Chiltern Hills region of England, with some filming also taking place at Pinewood Studios.
The film was briefly released in the United Kingdom by Tigon Pictures under the title Satan's Skin in January 1971. It premiered in New York City in April 1971 under the title The Blood on Satan's Claw, distributed by Cannon Films, and became a regular feature through the remainder of the year at drive-in theaters in the United States, paired as a double feature with The Beast in the Cellar. Tigon Pictures re-released the film as The Blood on Satan's Claw on 16 July 1971 in London, where it screened at the New Victoria Theatre, though this engagement lasted only one week following underwhelming ticket sales. The film did, however, continue to screen throughout the United Kingdom.
The Blood on Satan's Claw was met with mixed reviews from critics, and underperformed at the box office, though it did receive praise for its performances, cinematography, and atmosphere. In the intervening years, the film has gained a cult following, and has been cited by several film scholars as a progenitor of the folk horror genre. A spoken-word adaptation of the film, featuring Mark Gatiss and Hayden, was released by Audible in 2018, followed by a 2023 novelisation written by Wynne-Simmons, its original screenwriter.
Plot In a rural village in early 18th-century England, farmer Ralph Gower uncovers a deformed skull with one intact eye and strange fur. He insists that the local judge look at it, but it mysteriously vanishes. The judge disregards the incident, crediting it to Ralph's superstitious fears. Meanwhile, Peter Edmonton brings his fiancée, Rosalind Barton, to meet his aunt, Mistress Banham, with whom the judge is staying. Mistress Banham and the judge disapprove of the match and arrange for Rosalind to sleep in a disused attic room. Rosalind begins screaming during the night and injures Banham when she investigates, causing her to fall mysteriously ill.
Despite Peter's protests, the judge arranges to have Rosalind committed; as she is led out, Peter glimpses a monstrous claw in place of her hand. Meanwhile, three children find a claw from the deformed body from which the skull presumably came while playing next to a field. That evening, Mistress Banham disappears. Convinced that the house contains evil, Peter sneaks into the attic room at night and is attacked by a creature with a furred claw. He tries to hack it with a knife, but when the judge bursts in, he finds that Peter has severed his own hand. Though sceptical of supernatural involvement, the judge borrows a book on witchcraft. The next day, the judge departs for London, leaving the pompous and slow-witted Squire Middleton in charge, but promises to return.
Mark, one of the three children, is lured out by his classmates, who are playing truant from their scripture classes so they can play ritualistic games in a ruined church under their ringleader, Angel Blake. Mark is tricked into playing a lethal game of blind man's buff, and his body is hidden in his family's woodshed. Angel Blake attempts to seduce the curate, Reverend Fallowfield. When he resists, she tells him that Mark is dead and "had the devil in him, so we cut it out". At Mark's funeral, Angel's father speaks to the squire, accusing the curate of attempting to molest his daughter and, very possibly, of killing Mark.
Mark's sister, Cathy, is gathering flowers for his grave when two boys attack and bind her under the pretence of a game. Ralph, who has been courting her, hears her scream but cannot find her. The boys lead Cathy to Angel, who marches her in a procession with the other children to the ruined church, where they perform a Black Mass to the demon Behemoth, who appears as a furred beast. The children tear Cathy's dress to reveal fur on her back. All the children have been growing these patches of fur, which have been flayed from their bodies to restore the demon's physical form. The cult ritualistically rape and murder Cathy and flay the fur from her back. Ralph finds her body in the church and carries her to the squire, who releases Fallowfield but is unable to arrest Angel, who has vanished.
Ralph finds men attempting to drown a girl named Margaret, whom they suspect of witchcraft. He rescues her and finds fur on her leg. He convinces a doctor to remove it, but when Margaret wakes, she proves to be a committed servant of the devil and flees. The judge returns and sets dogs to track her. Margaret seeks out Angel, but Angel abandons her when she realises she no longer bears a piece of the demon's skin.
Margaret is caught and, interrogated by the judge, reveals that the cult will meet at the ruined church to complete the ritual to rebuild the demon's body. The judge assembles a mob to destroy the cult and demon. Ralph, whose leg has sprouted fur, awakens in the church surrounded by the cult. He nearly flays the fur from his legs in a trance before the mob attack. In the ensuing violence, Angel is killed, and the judge kills the demon with a sword, ending the curse on Ralph and returning him to normal.
Cast
Actress Roberta Tovey has an uncredited role as the coven member who lures Padbury's character to her death.
Production Development The film was originally envisioned by screenwriter Robert Wynne-Simmons as an anthology of three loosely connected but separate stories set in a Victorian era village, at the request of Tigon British Film Productions. The disparate stories included one involving a woman locked in an attic by her abusive aunt; a group of children who uncover a monstrous carcass in a field; and a man who cuts off his own hand, which is possessed by a demon. Each of the stories were connected by an overarching narrative of the pastoral village being infiltrated by various evil forces. Wynne-Simmons's screenplay was inspired in part by the Manson Family and the Mary Bell child murders. He later elaborated:
Tigon executives ultimately opted to have Wynne-Simmons transpose the story to an early-eighteenth-century farming community, having felt that the Victorian Era had been exhausted by various genre films. Wynne-Simmons stated that he was specifically asked by the producers to include a number of elements from the studio's previous film, Witchfinder General, such as the "Book of Witches" as well as the sequence in which Margaret is ducked in a body of water by locals who suspect she is a witch. "This had to be included because it had been so successful in Witchfinder General, so they wanted to repeat it," he recalled. "I didn't mind that so much, as it did show the incredible stupidity of people at the time." Additionally, several other changes were mandated by Tigon, including a redraft of the ending, which originally had the Judge enlisting a militia to murder the entire village to eradicate the cult. Tigon executives deemed this ending too bleak, and it was replaced with a finale in which the demon is defeated, and the villagers are spared.
Director Piers Haggard was hired to direct the project, and worked with Wynne-Simmons to retool the screenplay from its anthology format to a singular, cohesive narrative. Summarizing the screenplay, Haggard commented in 2003:
By Haggard's account, the film's original working title was The Devil's Touch, which was subsequently changed to Satan's Skin.
Casting Haggard says Linda Hayden had to be used as she was under contract to Tony Tenser. Tamara Ustinov, the daughter of actor Peter Ustinov, was cast in part because of her name. The role of the judge was originally offered to Peter Cushing, who declined it due to his wife's illness; Christopher Lee was considered, but his fee was too high for the budget so Patrick Wymark was cast instead. The film was Wymark's last English language film and was released three months after his death.
With the younger cast, Haggard dedicated two weeks prior to the shoot to hold rehearsals.
Filming
Filming began on 14 April 1970 on an initial budget of £75,000, which expanded to £82,000. The shoot lasted approximately eight weeks, and mainly took place in the small village of Bix Bottom, Oxfordshire, located in the Chiltern Hills. The ruined church that figures prominently is the old Saint James Church in Bix Bottom, which had been abandoned in 1875. Prior to its appearance in The Blood on Satan's Claw, the church had been used as a location in The Witches (1966).
The scene in which the villagers hold a funeral for Mark Vespers was shot in the village of Hurley, while portions of the woodland sequences were filmed in the Warburg Nature Reserve and Black Park near Iver Heath, Buckinghamshire. Additionally, some filming took place at Pinewood Film Studios.
Several of the younger cast members, particularly Hayden, Ustinov, and Richard Williams, recalled that Haggard's direction was concise and that the shoot operated smoothly.
The film was shot by cinematographer Dick Bush. When devising the film's visual elements, Haggard was influenced by the works of Ingmar Bergman, particularly The Seventh Seal (1957) and The Virgin Spring (1960). Haggard adopted a "painterly" style for the film, marked by low camera angles that cast the actors on high landscapes against open skies.
Anthony Ainley, who plays a curate who Linda Hayden's character attempted to seduce, once said in an interview, "When it came to doing the nude scene where Angel comes into the rectory at night and disrobes this was done at least three times and Linda was spot on with every take...she was a total professional with a refined sense of the erotic unusual for her age...I believe she was only 17 at the time."
Music The film's score was composed by Marc Wilkinson, an Australian composer who had previously worked alongside Haggard at the National Theatre. "[He] had a wonderful command of strange sounds," said the director. "He wasn't somebody who would ever give you a stock sound. And I think he absolutely excelled himself. It's certainly one of the best scores I've ever had for a film."
Release
In its native England, the film was passed by the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) with an X rating. Under ten seconds of cuts were mandated by the BBFC, though some sequences were optically darkened, including the scene in which a nude Angel attempts to seduce the Curate. According to screenwriter Wynne-Simmons, a shot of Angel performing oral sex on the demon was also significantly truncated and darkened, though a brief portion of it appears in the final cut of the film.
The film was originally given a brief theatrical release under the title Satan's Skin on 17 January 1971, screening in Birmingham as a double feature with Cauldron of Blood. It continued to be exhibited under this title through June 1971, screening in Coventry, Liverpool, and Coleshill.