The Wicker Man (2006 film)

Plot

Policeman Edward Malus gets news from his ex-fiancée, Willow Woodward, that her daughter Rowan is missing. He travels to an island off the coast of Washington where a group of neo-pagans live. They are led by Sister Summersisle, an elderly woman who represents the goddess they worship. Sister Summersisle explains to Edward that her ancestors had left England to avoid persecution, only to settle near Salem and find renewed persecution in the Salem witch trials before arriving on the island. Sister Summersisle explains that their population is predominantly female, as they choose the strongest stock—evading Edward's concern about the birth of unwanted males. The island's economy relies on the production of local honey, which Edward learns has declined recently.

Edward asks the villagers about Rowan, but they give him evasive answers. He later sees two men carrying a large bag that appears to be dripping blood and finds a fresh, unmarked grave in the churchyard. The grave contains only a burned doll, but Edward finds Rowan's sweater in the churchyard. At the village school, teacher Sister Rose tries to prevent Edward from seeing the class register. When he finds that Rowan's name is crossed out, he becomes outraged at Rose and her class. After a short discussion of the islanders' view of death, she explains that capital punishment is used to enforce their laws. Edward asks how Rowan died and Sister Rose tells him, "She'll burn to death." When Edward catches the tense she used, Sister Rose quickly corrects herself: "She burned to death." When Edward questions Willow about the grave, she reveals that Rowan is their daughter together. On the day of the fertility rite, Edward frantically searches the village for Rowan. Disguised in a bear suit, he joins the parade led by Sister Summersisle, which ends at the festival site.

Rowan is tied to a large tree, about to be burned. Edward rescues her and they run away through the woods, but Rowan leads him back to Sister Summersisle. Sister Summersisle thanks Rowan for her help, and Edward realizes that the search for Rowan was a setup the whole time. Willow, known on the island as Sister Willow, is the daughter of Sister Summersisle and chose Edward as a human sacrifice to restore the island's honey production (after Edward deliberately destroyed the beehives in their crop earlier). They carry him to an enormous wicker man where he is hoisted high above the ground and shut inside. Rowan sets fire to the wicker man, and Edward is sacrificed in a giant blaze amid his screams.

Six months later, Sisters Willow and Honey go to a bar and meet two policemen, one of whom graduated from the academy. Willow and Honey volunteer to go home with them.

Cast

• Nicolas Cage as Edward Malus, a police officer.
• Ellen Burstyn as Sister Summersisle, leader of the cult and Sister Willow's mother.
• Kate Beahan as Sister Willow Woodward, Edward's ex-fiancée.
• Leelee Sobieski as Sister Honey, one of the cult's leaders.
• Frances Conroy as Dr. T.H. Moss
• Molly Parker as Sister Rose / Sister Thorn
• Diane Delano as Sister Beech
• Mary Black as Sister Oak
• Christine Willes as Sister Violet
• Erika Shaye Gair as Rowan Woodward, Willow's daughter
• Michael Wiseman as Officer Pete
• David Purvis as Ivy
• Sophie Hough as Daisy
• Sam Velasquez as "Whitey"
• Aaron Eckhart as Truck Stop Patron
• George A. Murphy as Virginity Protector
• Matthew Walker as Sea Plane Pilot
• James Franco as Police Officer in a Bar
• Jason Ritter as Bar Guy #2
• Christa Campbell as Truck Stop Waitress

Production

Universal Pictures had been planning a remake of the 1973 film of the same name since the 1990s. The British film had been in the licensing library of Canal+, which was optioned by producer JoAnne Sellar to Universal. In March 2002 it was revealed that Neil LaBute was writing and directing The Wicker Man for Universal and Nicolas Cage's production company Saturn Films. Around the same time, the original film's director Robin Hardy and star Christopher Lee were preparing a semi-remake of their 1973 film, titled The Riding of the Laddie, with Vanessa Redgrave and Lee's Lord of the Rings co-star Sean Astin attached. Hardy stated Lee would not play the villain as he did in the original Wicker Man, but instead a door-to-door born again Christian preacher who comes to Scotland along with his wife (Redgrave) as they are introduced to the neo-pagan cult. Hardy hoped for filming to begin in Glasgow, Scotland in 2003, but The Riding of the Laddie would not materialize until years later, when it had undergone many changes to become the film The Wicker Tree. Universal's remake with LaBute moved forward, who changed the Scots setting to contemporary America. The remake rights eventually moved from Universal to Millennium Films. Filming began in Vancouver, Canada in July 2005. Millennium sold distribution rights to Alcon Entertainment for distribution through their output deal with Warner Bros. Pictures.

Reception

Box office

The Wicker Man opened on September 1, 2006, in 2,784 venues and earned $9.6 million in its opening weekend, ranking third in the US box office. The film closed on November 16, 2006, after eleven weeks of release, grossing $23.6 million in the US and $15.1 million overseas for a worldwide total of $38.8 million.

Critical response

Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film a rare average grade of "F" on an A+ to F scale.

On At the Movies, the film got two thumbs down from Richard Roeper and Aisha Tyler, although they both said the film was "entertainingly bad".

Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly wrote that the original film is overrated, but the remake's climax lacks its "tingle of madness".

Legacy

The original film's director, Robin Hardy, had expressed skepticism over the Hollywood remake and had his lawyers make Warner Bros. remove his name from the remake's promotional material. According to Hardy, he was given writing credit for the screenplay when he had not received any for the original. Christopher Lee, who played Lord Summerisle in the original film, commented: "I don't believe in remakes. You can make a follow-up to a film, but to remake a movie with such history and success just doesn't make sense to me."

Cage himself acknowledged that the film was "absurd". He remarked in 2010, "There is a mischievous mind at work on The Wicker Man, you know? You know what I mean? And I finally kind of said, 'I might have known that the movie was meant to be absurd.' But saying that now after the fact is OK, but to say it before the fact is not, because you have to let the movie have its own life." In February 2012, Cage gave a live webchat with fans to promote Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance. When asked what roles from his career he would most like to revisit, Cage responded, "I would like to hook up with one of the great Japanese filmmakers, like the master that made Ringu, and I would like to take The Wicker Man to Japan, except this time he's a ghost."

A scene exclusive to the unrated version of the film, where Nicolas Cage's character gets tortured by bees, as well a separate scene where he discovers the burned doll have become internet memes.

Accolades

The film garnered five Golden Raspberry Award nominations but did not win any:

• Worst Picture – lost to Basic Instinct 2
• Worst Actor (Cage) – lost to Marlon and Shawn Wayans for Little Man
• Worst Screenplay (LaBute) – lost to Leora Barish and Henry Bean for Basic Instinct 2
• Worst Remake or Rip-off – lost to Little Man
• Worst On-Screen Couple (Cage and his bear suit) – lost to Shawn Wayans and either Kerry Washington or Marlon Wayans for Little Man

At the 2006 Stinkers Bad Movie Awards, the film garnered two nominations, one of which was a win:

• Worst Actor (Cage) – lost to Tim Allen for The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause, The Shaggy Dog, and Zoom
• Worst Remake – won

Home media

The film was released on DVD on December 19, 2006, with an unrated alternate ending included. The film continues in the same way as the theatrical version until the ending. Before Malus is taken to the wicker man to be burned alive, he is overpowered and tackled by villagers and sedated with a hive of bees, whose venom he is allergic to. The credits then begin after the wicker man's burning head falls off, omitting the "6 months later" scene. A Blu-ray of the film was released on January 30, 2007.

References

References

1. "The Wicker Man". [[AFI Catalog of Feature Films]].
2. "The Wicker Man (2006)". British Film Institute.
3. (August 14, 2006). "''THE WICKER MAN'' (12A)". [[British Board of Film Classification]].
4. "The Wicker Man 2006". [[Turner Broadcasting System]] ([[Time Warner]]).
5. "The Wicker Man 1973". [[Turner Broadcasting System]] ([[Time Warner]]).
6. Jonathan Bing. (March 20, 2002). "'Wicker' horror war erupts". Variety.
7. Dana Harris. (March 3, 2005). "Nic's next pic is indie 'Wicker'". Variety.
8. "Warner Bros and Alcon Entertainment sign new agreement".
9. (September 4, 2006). "Weekend Box Office Results for September 1–3, 2006". [[Internet Movie Database]].
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12. "''The Wicker Man'' Reviews". [[CBS Interactive]].
13. (April 3, 2020). "Is an "F" from CinemaScore Actually a Good Thing? Our Critics Weigh In". [[The A.V. Club]].
14. (2006-09-09). "The Last Kiss/SherryBaby/Broken Bridges/The Wicker Man/The Protector".
15. Gleiberman. (30 August 2006). "The Wicker Man". [[Entertainment Weekly]].
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17. Drew McWeeny. (7 April 2010). "Interview with Nicolas Cage". [[HitFix]].
18. Cage, Nicolas. (February 2012). "Exclusive Nicolas Cage Webchat".
19. (15 April 2022). "How Nic Cage embraced 'The Wicker Man' meme for 'The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent'".
20. (22 March 2022). "The Wicker Man Was An Intentional Comedy, Says Nicolas Cage". ScreenRant.
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