Warning: As a potential Death Trope for successful examples, many unmarked spoilers are ahead.
Burn the Witch! in Live-Action Films.
- In The Addams Family, Wednesday chose an ancestor who was executed in this fashion for a school project about role models. Naturally, her teacher was more than a little concerned. Morticia explains that the ancestor in question danced naked in the streets and enslaved a minister.Morticia: But don't worry. We've told Wednesday, "college first."
- Subverted in Agora, where the philosopher Hypatia, after being caught by the Christians who considered her a witch, was only burned after she was dead. Note that there is still some debate on whether the Real Life Hypatia was burned alive or stoned to death, though the general view is the one shown in the movie, that first she was stoned and then burned.
- And in any case, while there were some rumours of Hypatia practicing magic in Real Life, it didn't seem to be the primary reason for attack on her even for the mobbers themselves.
- Anazapta (aka Black Plague). A mob become convinced that Jacques is responsible for the plague arriving in their village, so tie him up by the ankles and lower him into the well. Even though it's implied Jacques does have dark powers, he drowns instead of being 'rejected' by the water and is only saved by the protagonist accidentally inventing CPR several centuries early.
- In Assassin's Creed, Tomás de Torquemada and The Spanish Inquisition track down and burn the Spanish Assassin Brotherhood at the stake like heretics in the wake of the Fall of Granada in 1491-1492. Torquemada is actually a Templar leader, the mortal enemy faction to the Assassins.
- Baghead (2023): The brotherhood tried to kill the woman who later return as Baghead by claiming she was a witch and having her burned at the stake. This ends very badly for them.
- Invoked in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. Lex Luthor knows that Superman is Clark Kent, so he kidnaps Martha Kent to force him to work for him. Luthor claims Superman is a devil, and since Martha is his mother, she must be a witch. The word "Witch" is etched onto her forehead and Luthor has a mook prepared to kill her with a flamethrower. Fortunately, Batman saves her.
- In Black Death, Ulric saves a woman from this fate by giving her a mercy-kill. This serves as his Establishing Character Moment.
- City of the Dead begins with a witch burning in 17th century New England. Ironically enough the film was made in the UK, with the entire cast as Fake Americans.
- Conan the Barbarian (2011): Maliva, Khalar Zym's wife and Marique's mom, was burned alive for evil sorcery.
- Cry of the Banshee: Trying to extract the location of the witch Oona from the villagers, Lord Edward seizes a young woman someone accuses of being a witch, has her tied to a wagon wheel and burned on bonfire in the village square.
- Curse of the Crimson Altar: Lavinia Morley was burned for witchcraft, and this event is recreated in Greymarsh every Witch's Night, with Lavinia being burned in effigy.
- Dark Shadows: Invoked by Barnabas, as an (empty) threat against Angelique. She is really a witch. But she is also a Villain with Good Publicity, and now living in an age where witches are no longer persecuted... unlike murderers, such as the vampire Barnabas.
- In Elizabeth, several Catholic priests are executed like this.
- In Ghostbusters II a judge laments that he is not able to sentence them to be burned at the stake, which he sees as an "illustrious, sterner justice".
- Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters:
- Fire is the most reliable method for killing witches, and the antagonists led by the Hot Witch Muriel are looking to produce a potion that will make them fireproof. And Gretel's heart and blood is one of the keys for it.
- Even more: Hansel and Gretel's Missing Mom Adrianna was a good witch, and ended up dying like this. In the meantime, her husband/the siblings' father was hanged. It turns out Muriel set them up to be executed so she could reach for Gretel and use her for her plans.
- Hawk the Slayer meets the first of his Ragtag Bunch of Misfits when he rescues a witch from a couple of peasants who want to burn her cursing their hogs. She was actually trying to cure them, but they're not in the mood to listen. She replays Hawk by using her magic to locate the rest of his group and teleport Hawk to each one.
- Highlander: When Connor MacLeod first discovers he is an immortal back in ancient Scotland, he's proclaimed a witch, and burning is mentioned as an option. (In the end, he's just run out of town by a howling mob instead.)
- Averted, of all places, in Hocus Pocus, where the three witches are hanged by the townsfolk just as they would have been in 17th Century Salem. (And the fact that they were actually guilty of witchcraft in this case.) They get better, but it's a little jarring to see historical accuracy in a movie about cartoonishly wacky witches. The revived witches are also locked in a large kiln and set on fire; the oven is a reference to "Hansel and Gretel". They get better from that as well. The thing that finally kills them is sunlight, because the candle that brought them back only worked for the night of Halloween, and they were unable to obtain the potion that would have enabled them to survive.
- Witches are among the people prosecuted by The Holy Office in an auto-de-fé. However they're not burnt, instead the Jews are, as was practice for the Inquisition.
- In the 80s-90s Icelandic film The Juniper Tree
, the mother of two little girls, Margit and Katla, is burned to death for witchcraft. - In The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, Toby thinks Alexei has strapped Angelica to cross and is planning to burn her as part of the Holy Week celebrations. It is actually a delusion caused by Toby's slipping sanity. She is strapped to a cross, but what he sees as flames are just billows of cloth intended to simulate fire.
- Used straight — and to hideously appropriate effect — in Mark of the Devil. Within that film, several "witches" (all clearly innocent) are slowly burnt alive. This film presents various period tortures in historically accurate ways, which makes it rather disturbing...
- Played ridiculously straight in Metropolis. During the revolt, the workers burn Robot!Maria at the stake, since they decide she's to blame for the revolution ending badly. They were right... sort of. On a pyre made of burning automobiles, no less!
- Monty Python and the Holy Grail has the infamous "Witch Trial" scene where a rather vocally pyromaniac mob accuses a woman of being a witch and Sir Bedevere attempts to use logic to ascertain whether she actually is one.
- In The Name of the Rose, Brother Salvatore and Brother Remigio are burned at the stake as scapegoats by Father Bernardo Gui, leader of the Inquisition. Gui also tries to burn a local peasant girl, but she is rescued by rebellious peasants who manage to kill Gui in the resulting chaos. In the book, Gui prevents this from happening by simply having the three of them transported away and executed elsewhere, where no rescue attempts can occur.
- In Night of the Eagle, Flora uses witchcraft to set fire to the Taylor home with Tansy trapped inside. She even says the words "burn, witch, burn" as she ignites the tarot cards to cast the spell.
- This is basically what started the terror for the series A Nightmare on Elm Street. The families of Elm Street, justifiably, hunted down a child-killer and general bad guy who got Off on a Technicality only to have him come back later rather upset about all of it.
- In Nothing but the Night, Anna Harb is murdered by being dressed up as the guy and then dropped on to the bonfire during Guy Fawkes night.
- Averted in The Old Guard, which correctly shows Andy and Quynh being hung as witches. However this doesn't work because they're immortal, so the trope is lampshaded when they assume their captors will try burning next. Turns out they have a far worse fate in mind...
- The Ωmega Man: After the Family capture Neville and put him through a Kangaroo Court for "heresy" (namely, being a normal human and a scientist), they try to burn him at the stake in Dodgers Stadium. Fortunately, he's saved by Lisa and Dutch.
- Full Moon Entertainment's movie version of The Pit and the Pendulum (1991), taking place during The Spanish Inquisition, naturally invokes this trope a couple of times. Of particular note is a scene where an old woman, soon to be burned at the stake, manages to ingest some conveniently placed gunpowder before hand. This results in a very messy explosion once she catches aflame. In Real Life, sacks of gunpowder were sometimes tied around the necks of those condemned to the stake as an act of mercy.
- Averted in Practical Magic, which begins with the (failed) hanging of the main characters' female ancestor. She was exiled instead.
- In Red Riding Hood, everyone thinks Valerie is a witch because she can understand the Wolf and everyone thinks the Wolf only wants her, so she is offered up as a Human Sacrifice.
- Requiem (2021): Inaccurately, convicted witches in early 1600s England face being burned at the stake. In actual fact, the punishment in England was hanging (but Scotland did have burning). Mary is later burned for supposedly enchanting Evelyn into having been her lover.
- Happens to Wanda Grubwart in Scooby-Doo! Curse of the Lake Monster, when she was alive in the 1800s.
- Averted in Season of the Witch which shows three accused women being hung off a bridge, then lowered into the water to drown just in case they survived the Neck Snap. Unfortunately for the priest carrying out the ritual, one of them is Not Quite Dead.
- Done in the Silent Hill movie twice on screen, and another one is mentioned. The ones on-screen were an adult and an 8-year old girl, and the burning of the 8-year old (and her surviving) is what sets off the plot of the movie. What's even worse is that they don't bother to put her burned, half-alive body off-screen◊.
- Subverted in Solomon Kane. The villagers attempt to burn the witch, but the witch uses magic to not only survive, but burn the village and its inhabitants.
- Parodied in the 1979 Disney comedy A Spaceman In King Arthurs Court, wherein the eponymous astronaut is to be burned at the stake. He knows his thermal-insulated spacesuit will protect him, but then the suit's airconditioner is accidentally turned off and he must sweat it out until his bonds burn through.
- The Tempest (2010): Antonio spread rumours that Prospera used Black Magic to kill her husband despite "knowing that others of my sex have burned for far less".
- In Theatre of Death, one of the sketches in the theatre involves Dani being burnt at the stake as a witch. For a moment, it looks as is Nicole is intending to burn her for real.
- The Brotherhood in Twins of Evil regularly burns women who they consider to be witches. They are called out for this by Count Karnstein and Anton Hoffner. For extra irony, the threat to the village is not witches, but vampires- which fire is useless against.
- Played straight in the MSTed movie The Touch of Satan, where the heroine's sister is nearly burned at the stake after being accused of witchcraft... in 19th-Century California.Mob: BURN THE WITCH! BURN THE WITCH!
Mike: Oh, and Go Packers too, but mostly burn the witch. - In Up the Chastity Belt, Lurkalot is accused of being a witch after having been seen flying (It Makes Sense in Context). First he is dunked in the well till he confesses to being a witch, and then is placed on a pyre to be burned. The villagers have trouble lighting him because he is so waterlogged.
- The titular character in Valerie and Her Week of Wonders is nearly burned at the stake for being accused of witchcraft. When told to repent, she childishly sticks her tongue out with a huge grin on her face.
- The (pseudo)historical/horror movie Witchfinder General, which definitely played fast and loose with history. Justified, in that burning was something new that Matthew Hopkins was trying out. The most common form of execution is hanging.
- In Witch Way Love, it is explained that some witches and sorcerers found ways around this problem. As a result, they can't die upon being burned and liquefy instead.
