The Wicker Man: Film (1973)

The Wicker Man (1973)

Dir. Robin Hardy

Police Sergeant Howie (Edward Woodward) travels alone to a remote Scottish island to investigate the disappearance of a young girl, but the local villagers hinder his efforts at every turn.

Undeterred, the single-minded officer digs deeper and discovers things that shock and offend him, both on a literal and spiritual level.

The Wicker Man has singing, dancing, and Christopher Lee in a wig and summer dress. I'm sincere when I say it's perhaps the most unique British film ever made (certainly that I've ever seen, at least) and is arguably both Christopher Lee's and Edward Woodward's finest moment. Both men had a CV filled with superb work, many times over, so it's high praise indeed.

It's been described as "The Citizen Kane of Horror Movies," and while that means absolutely nothing in real terms (I don’t even consider it a horror film) it's undeniably atypical and for that alone deserves to be applauded, even if you hate it.

The Region B Blu-ray edition pictured above contains three cuts of the film, each with a different run time. While it would be fun for me to document what I feel are the failings and merits of each version, I'm not going to because I'm endeavouring to avoid spoilers.

The Theatrical Cut (87 mins) is the only version we had for many years. Despite its flaws and missing footage it's the one that I fell in love with. In retrospect, however, it should probably be avoided in favour of one (or both) of the subsequent two.

My preference today is the version known as the Director's Cut (102 mins) because it added fifteen minutes of extra pagan joy to the Theatrical Cut and relocated a key scene to a more fitting position in the narrative, and in so doing made it make a lot more sense!

If you're viewing the film for the first time, then the Final Cut (94 mins) is probably the best choice. Even though it omits some early scenes that provide valuable insight into Sergeant Howie, it does a decent job of representing both of the previous versions. The key scene I mentioned previously (Willow's Song) is in the more favourable position but, frustratingly, it's the edited version. Nevertheless, The Final Cut is definitely a good all-round option.

A NOTE ON PQ + EDITING: The Final Cut is the only version presented in HD, with the others in SD. But because the restored scenes came from a different source (they were taken from a positive print that Roger Corman had in his possession) the PQ is variable even in the HD version. You'll be able to spot easily the scenes that were added (i.e., that were absent in the Theatrical Cut), and their reinsertion means the editing that leads into and out of them is sometimes less than perfect, but hopefully it won't ruin your enjoyment too much.

EDIT: the day after this post went up StudioCanal announced a new 4K scan of the film was coming (due 04/09/23) to disc. It'll likely be better than the pictured one, but only time will tell.