His House, a ghostly horror movie from Netflix that also functions as a heart-wrenching drama, uses South Sudanese folklore to explore modern themes of refugee trauma and guilt, but how accurate was it? The "night witch," or apeth, that torments the main characters in the movie is, in fact, a real belief held by the Dinka people in South Sudan, while the filmmaker utilizes specific aspects of the myth to add depth to the refugee experience.
Like any true Gothic haunted house story, His House uses elements of the supernatural as a metaphor to explore negative emotions emanating from the grief, heartbreak, and isolation experienced by the main characters. Bol and Rial are refugees from South Sudan who fled sectarian violence only to meet the cold, unfeeling bureaucracy of the British immigration system. While Bol optimistically tries to assimilate to this new way of life, his wife Rial is depressed, lonely, and frustrated at the uncaring and condescendingly xenophobic attitude of her new surroundings.
In response to what she interprets as her husband's misguided cheerfulness, Rial tells Bol a story about a man who, despite being honorable, became so desperate to escape poverty that he stole from other people's houses. One day, Rial explains, the man stole from the residence of an apeth, meaning that this night witch was able to haunt the man's new home despite all of his ill-gotten fortunes. The tale is meant to point out the selfishness of Bol's pursuits, but the aside implies there's more to the couple's backstory than initially established. Furthermore, the scene establishes that the film's antagonistic force of evil is somehow connected to Bol's past actions. The real elements of Sudanese folklore, specifically Dinka mythology, add to the movie's abject terror and strengthens the underlying message.
The Dinka's Night Witch Is A Destructive Force Of Evil
The main source of information on witchcraft of the Dinka people comes from British anthropologist Godfrey Lienhardt, who devoted his studies to the Dinka religion. His article written in 1951 for the International African Institute, "Some Notions of Witchcraft Among the Dinka", sheds light on the apeth and helps to enrich the evil eye," a concept that says as much about Bol and Rial's suspiciously xenophobic neighbors as it does their haunting.
Night witches are the most malicious wielders of magic since their main intentions are always to harm others without receiving anything as a trade-off. Thieves like the one in Rial's story may be creating hardship for those they steal from, but their deeds are motivated by the goal of gaining benefits for themselves. The apeth, on the other hand, lives only to "eat," a distinction made to describe the fact that the witch consumes the good fortune of its victims, leaving nothing but misery in its wake. Lienhardt talks about this idea in the context of the community or family unit, a thematic connection to His House.
The apeth seeks to defile the homestead and disrupt domestic order, mirroring the tense relationship between Bol and Rial as well as the pain they feel from having to leave their homeland. Lienhardt explains that this is meant to dehumanize its victims and bring them into a lower, animalistic realm, a feeling that is accurately captured by both the ethnic cleansing the couple barely escapes and the isolation of having to live in a run-down tenement surrounded by hostile outsiders. The witch tries to exploit its victims' guilt and trauma and tempts Bol and Rial into giving up their lives, but the couple refrains from letting the apeth consume them. In this way, His House references the central traits of the Dinka boogeyman to enunciate its characters' emotional conflict and eventual redemption.
