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Bookmark this pageThe Wicker Man (1973)
Director: Robin Hardy
Movie review
From Time Out London
Robin Hardy’s bizarre 1973 cult classic is the oddest of the ‘Summer of British Film’ weekly reissues. Set on the Western Isles of Scotland, it poses a burning question for investigating mainland Sergeant Edward Woodward: could a missing 12-year-old girl have been sacrificed in some creepy, ancient fertility rite by the libidinous, pre-feudal inhabitants? Anthony Shaffer’s script – written at the end of an annus mirabilis in which he also wrote ‘Sleuth’ and ‘Frenzy’ – brews together a heady concoction of police procedural and post-Hammer horror with a pagan pastiche of counter-cultural faddishness, with scenes of dancing naked pregnant women in stone circles or a ranting, windswept Christopher Lee in drag beautifully filmed by Harry Waxman and accompanied by Paul Giovanni’s risible ’60s-style folk revival soundtrack. Essentially, it’s an insane guilty pleasure, still enjoyable for its delightfully eccentric casting – Britt Ekland’s fine Scottish accent and Hammer star Ingrid Pitt’s dour librarian – and for the funniest, creepiest pub scene in British movies outside of next week’s reissue, ‘Withnail & I’.Author: Wally Hammond
Time Out London Issue 1931: August 22-28 2007
User reviews of this film
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- Richard Clay said...
- Posted on Aug 27 2007 16:21 Two deluded fanatics in a struggle that will prove fatal to at least one - probably both - of them. The kitsch black comedy of the first hour or so burns away in the loathesome nastiness of the last few minutes. What could have been nothing more than an amusing 70s period piece is given a touch of real tragedy by Edward Woodward's astonishing central performance.
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- Simon said...
- Posted on Aug 22 2007 13:14 Repeatedly watchable, unique, memorable, still unsurpassed and with a terrific, haunting soundtrack.
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Cast & crew
Director: Robin Hardy
Producer: Peter Snell
Cast: Edward Woodward, Britt Ekland, Diane Cilento, Ingrid Pitt, Christopher Lee, Lesley Mackie, Walter Carr, Lindsay Kemp full cast
Genre(s): Thrillers
Rated: 18
Duration: 84 mins
UK Release: Aug 24 2007
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