Oct 021973
 
five reels

Devout police sergeant Howie (Edward Woodward) travels to a private, remote, Scottish island to investigate the disappearance of a schoolgirl.  He is disgusted to find a colony of pagans, practicing nude rituals and public sex, who are hiding the truth of the missing girl.

Sergeant Howie (played with appropriate frustration by Woodward) is unpleasant from his first moment onscreen.  He is inflexible, self-righteous, cruel, and willing to break the law he keeps yelling he is there to uphold.  Told differently, this could be a horror story about a man surrounded by evil, but that isn’t this story.  This is the story of a fool who enters paradise and can’t see it.  He is not outraged that somewhere there must be a murderer; he is outraged that the murderer, and the other islanders, have not accepted their “proper” place in society, that they do not believe as he believes.  And in this, Howie is far too much like the average man. Though this paradise has a few fanged snakes.

If you aren’t in the mood for a thoughtful movie, this is an enjoyable film.  The mystery is engaging, and who can be unhappy about a nude fertility dance from Britt Ekland.  Christopher Lee makes an excellent pagan lord of the manor, and his exchanges with Howie contain most of the best lines.

Lord:   I am confident your suspicions are wrong, Sergeant. We do not commit murder here. We are a deeply religious people.

Howie: Religious? With ruined churches, no ministers, no priests… and children dancing naked!

Lord:   They do love their divinity lessons.

Howie: But they are…are naked!

Lord:   Well, naturally. It’s much too dangerous to jump through fire with their clothes on.

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

The Wicker Man is generally called a horror film, but I think “cult” is a far better category for it. It doesn’t go for cheap scares, nor does it care about normal struture. The film has multiple songs (enough for the director to call it, only partly joking, a musical). There are dream-like sequences that may or may not be part of a dream. And a few long speeches. It is its own kind of movie, and a brilliant one. Lee called it his finest film and I agree. This isn’t Halloween viewing, but think about it for May Day.

There are multiple versions laying about, which go by a confusing number of names, but I’ll simply call them the Short, Medium, and Long cuts. The Short version is a studeo required hack-job, done by execs who had no interest in the film. It cuts important moments, removes a day, and moves around scenes for no good reason. Avoid it. Between the other two, there is less reason to choose one over the other. The Long cut has extra bits at the beginning of Howie in his police station and at church. Those aren’t necessary, and I slightly prefer the Medium cut.