Religion

onager

(9,356 posts) Sat Aug 25, 2012, 05:26 PM Aug 2012

The Wicker Tree (movie non-review)

OK, laugh at me for being my usual culturally backward self, but I just found out about this movie. I think it was only released on DVD earlier this year, and it popped up on my cable TV on-demand listings just this week.

If the title sounds familiar, it should - "Wicker Tree" was written and directed by Robin Hardy, director of "The Wicker Man" way back in 1973.

This movie has everything I could possibly want in a religious movie - ancient castles/churches, beautiful Scottish scenery, dimbulb Texas Fundies complete with Purity Rings, nudity, casual sex, human sacrifice and cannibalism.

It also stars the woman with the coolest real name ever, Honeysuckle Weeks. I've liked her since she played Sam Stewart in the great BBC series "Foyle's War."

This is a non-review because I don't want to do any SPOILERS. I'll just note that it covers some of the same themes as "Wicker Man," only turned 180 degrees and played for laughs. LOTS of laughs:

"Beth and Steve will be witnessing to the lost souls of Scotland. I'm told that many people there don't even believe in angels!"

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0323808/

MY USUAL RANDOM STREAM-OF-UNCONSCIOUSNESS CRAP:

As a card-carrying Militant Atheist, naturally I loved "The Wicker Man" for what I saw as a basically atheist POV. Smug pagans often claim that "Wicker Man" is about two competing belief systems, and the Old Religion wins out over the upstart Xianity in the end. Smug Xians say no, Our Side won because Sgt. Howie remained unconverted. And virginal.

Huh? I see it as being about 2 competing belief systems that do not ever work. The Summerisle pagans keep offering up those lovely sunset sacrifices and their crops keep failing. Sgt. Howie keeps praying to Jebus, and that doesn't help him either.

Then there were the hilarious little touches. Like the classroom of teen girls, sitting thru a lecture on phallic symbolism and fertility rites. All of them looking as bored as any teens anywhere, listening to a teacher drone on about history or geography.

I wouldn't even mention the 2006 re-make of "Wicker Man." Except to note that is further proof a god does not exist, and if one did, Nicolas Cage should have had his ass smited off by now.

3 replies

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The Wicker Tree (movie non-review) (Original Post) onager Aug 2012 OP

The WickerMan (1973 version) Heddi Aug 2012 #1

It's OK. Just don't expect... onager Aug 2012 #2

I watched it last night... Heddi Aug 2012 #3

Heddi

(18,312 posts)

1. The WickerMan (1973 version)

Reply to onager (Original post)

Sat Aug 25, 2012, 08:15 PM

Aug 2012

is my ultimate favourite movie in all of the world> I know it by heart. Mr. Hed and I feel incomplete if we haven't watched it at least once a month.

He got me the director's cut for Christmas last year. Has a bunch of removed scenes. I don't think they really add anything to the movie, and prefer the version that we all know and love better.

I have the soundtrack on my iphone

I haven't seen the Wicker Tree...I was waffling...would it be okay, would it be a POS? I guess i'll have to plunk down $4 and get it from amazon on demand...sigh

onager

(9,356 posts)

2. It's OK. Just don't expect...

Reply to Heddi (Reply #1)

Sun Aug 26, 2012, 04:11 PM

Aug 2012

...anything nearly as good as the original.

Here's some weird trivia for you. There are several interviews with Robin Hardy about the movie hanging around the web, but here's the gist:

"Wicker Tree" is based on a novel Robin Hardy wrote, called "Cowboys For Christ."

According to Hardy, he was visiting Texas once and somebody invited him to a "Cowboys For Christ" church service. Hardy thought they were joking and didn't believe such a thing even existed.

Then they took him to an actual Cowboys For Christ meeting, which amazed him.

Hardy makes it clear that "Wicker Tree" is not intended as a sequel to "Wicker Man." He calls it a "companion piece."

I never knew this - Anthony Shaffer, author of the original "Wicker Man" script, did write a sequel to it, about 15 years after the first movie. He wanted Hardy to direct. In the sequel, Sgt. Howie survived his "appointment with the Wicker Man."

According to Hardy, the script wasn't that good. Shaffer himself eventually agreed and they dropped the idea.

Christopher Lee appears VERY briefly in "Wicker Tree." Hardy wanted him to have a bigger part, but Lee was injured while making a movie in Mexico and his health wouldn't allow the strain of a bigger part. Injured while making a movie? Jebus! Lee is 90 years old, according to Wiki. What a trouper!

Heddi

(18,312 posts)

3. I watched it last night...

Reply to onager (Reply #2)

Sun Aug 26, 2012, 10:46 PM

Aug 2012

There were some chuckle moments. I much preferred The Wicker Man, and as you said, I saw it more as a companion than a sequel or even related story.

I felt that the dialogue in TWM was much cleverer and I felt that TWT kind of "forced" the scenes and interactions with characters.

My favourite scene in TWM, and possibly one of my favourite examples of metaphor in film is when Sgt. Howie is driven to torment by Willow singing "Willow's Song". The scene captured his torment, his temptation quite well. And we got to see a stand-in shaking her labia as she pretended to be Britt Ekland banging on a wall...

And TWT never really explained (or maybe it did and I zoned out) why these 2 folks were chosen. It was made clear that Sgt. Howie was chosen because he was virtuous, chaste, under the order of the king, and arrived on his own free will. The 2 Characters in TWT, I didn't get. Maybe because they were born-again? That seemed to be a heavy theme....sin then redemption.

All in all, I'd give it 3 stars out of 5. And I really want to give it 2.5 stars, but I'll add 1/2 a star for Christopher Lee's inclusion. I read he was the most prolific actor, having acted in at least one movie released a year since 1700 or whenever it was he started acting.

And on edit, I just thought that the writing and the dialogue between characters in The Wicker Man was just spot on.

Sergeant Howie: And what of the TRUE God? Whose glory, churches and monasteries have been built on these islands for generations past? Now sir, what of him?

Lord Summerisle: He's dead. Can't complain, had his chance and in modern parlance, blew it.

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Lord Summerisle: I think I could turn and live with animals. They are so placid and self-contained. They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins. They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God. Not one of them kneels to another or to his own kind that lived thousands of years ago. Not one of them is respectable or unhappy, all over the earth.
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Sergeant Howie: Your lordship seems strangely... unconcerned.
Lord Summerisle: Well I'm confident your suspicions are wrong, Sergeant. We don't commit murder here. We're a deeply religious people.
Sergeant Howie: Religious? With ruined churches, no ministers, no priests... and children dancing naked!
Lord Summerisle: They do love their divinity lessons.
Sergeant Howie: [outraged] But they are... a-are NAKED!
Lord Summerisle: Naturally! It's much too dangerous to jump through fire with their clothes on!
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Sergeant Howie: What religion can they possibly be learning jumping over bonfires?
Lord Summerisle: Parthenogenesis.
Sergeant Howie: What?
Lord Summerisle: Literally, as Miss Rose would doubtless say in her assiduous way, reproduction without sexual union.
Sergeant Howie: Oh, what is all this? I mean, you've got fake biology, fake religion... Sir, have these children never heard of Jesus?
Lord Summerisle: Himself the son of a virgin, impregnated, I believe, by a ghost...

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