The Wicker Tree

As a fan of Hardy's original film, I wasn't expecting much. Sure enough, it's nothing like The Wicker Man. The mystery and foreboding mood are replaced by a lighthearted character-driven drama-cum-thriller, and it's nowhere near as grabbing. Still, this isn't bad. I liked how it toyed with the born-again Christian evangelism, drawing parallels to amoral carnal paganism even as the two are contrasted. I liked how the intially obnoxious "virgin" Beth eventually redeems herself by growing balls.

A cute little throwback to the 70s classic but completely lacking its hypnotic power. There are some beautiful shots of ruins and pastoral locations but on a whole the acting is dismal (especially from the braindead lead) and the script is pretty lazy and oddly chaste, lacking a sense of 'ritual' like the original. However I'm very easily entertained when he comes to erotic pagan weirdness so I enjoyed myself. Just dont expect much. Way better than the Nic Cage mess obvs.

Often, watching a film I find lacking, I ask, "Where's the good?" The good, however, is not to be found in THE WICKER TREE. It's a film best watched with a dropped jaw and raised eyebrows. Robin Hardy's clumsy, lifeless direction further dooms his monumentally asinine script (Anthony Shaffer is MUCH missed); the acting is uniformly awful, with the worst Texan accents on record; the cinematography is mediocre; it's boring; it somehow messes up gratuitous nudity. It is an undiluted disaster.

Lost interest in the movie from ten minutes I just kept seeing because I was doing other things and for the country boy that was to me a hunky guy.

I approached this film with no small amount of trepidation, as I love the original and I know that sequels, prequels and companion films tend to be vastly inferior pieces of work. The only thing that did give me cause to maybe begin thinking that this might be an OK film, was that it was directed by Robin Hardy, who directed The Wicker Man, but I was still fairly wary, and I was right to be. It's awful! It's very poorly acted, badly written, badly filmed (except for a few shots here and there, w

Entertaining piece of fluff, loses it's way near the end. Perhaps played a bit straighter, perhaps with a stronger lead... Still, there's a charm to it, don't regret staying in on a Saturday night to watch it.

Goes without saying that this is better than Cage's abomination, but still as awkward as humanly possible. Christopher Lee's in it for all of 2 seconds....