UPDATE (4/22): The contest officially ended on Friday (4/19) and a winner has been chosen. There were some really great write-ups, but in the end we decided on Gary Alcock's entry. In it, Gary talks about his first viewing of the film and how his feelings about the movie have since changed. Congrats, Gary! You can still read all the entries in the comments section below. Thanks to all of those who entered!
It's contest time, folks! I've got number 1 of 50 of Brandon Schaefer's stunning The Wicker Man print up for grabs. And guess what? All you need to do to win it is tell us why you love / respect / admire / whatever The Wicker Man. Maybe you could write about your first experience with the film or that one time you and a few friends sacrificed that virginal copper to the old gods for harvest. Who knows? It's completely up to you. Not bad, right? Please leave a comment below with your (brief or long) write-up and an email address where I can reach you should you be the lucky winner. This contest is open internationally and will be ending on April 19th, meaning you have an entire month to come up with something good. The winner will be chosen based on his or her story / anecdote / what have you. Now have at it!
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| The Wicker Man Movie Poster Brandon Schaefer 26.5" x 38.5" (Screen Print) - Numbered £40 (UK) / £50 (International) - Limited to 50 |
As a quick reminder, Schaefer's The Wicker Man is currently available through the FrightFest Originals website and measures 26.5" x 38.5. There's also a bunch of other great film prints, including posters for Razorback, Hostel, Martyrs, Zombie Flesh Eaters, and Night Breed. To see more of Brandon's work, visit seekandspeak.com, silverscreensociety.com, and follow @seekandspeak on Twitter. For the latest news on FrightFest Originals, head over to frightfestoriginals.com, sign up for their mailing list, and follow @frightfestorigi.Good luck!
I like wicker man because it was the first movie I saw that had a M Knight Shalamalamam type ending and it was way before that guy started making crappy movies. I started liking Wicker Man a lot more after I saw how bad the remake was.
ReplyDeletedanportino@gmail.com
It's the best misdirection movie ever. Up until the reveal, you have no clue as to what is going on with this island, these people, or this lost kid. Everyone seems to be in this hallucinogenic state of lustful euphoria. Then the ending hits and the movie makes a hard left turn.
ReplyDeletejaybranch1ataol.com
That eerie soundtrack is to blame! I still remember how my jaw dropped listening to that soundtrack as I witnessed the twist on the screen.
ReplyDeleteAfter all, it was hard to digest the following quote:
"Don't you see that killing me is not going to bring back your apples?"
nmanma (at) superonline (dot) com
The Wicker Man
ReplyDeleteSome misguided fools would have you believe that all that went before was golden, that you should never revisit the past, learn from or even acknowledge the work of our forefathers. According to these self righteous dullards the most heinous sin of all is 'The Remake', which they decry as some perverse and craven attempt by shadowy, rapey, big studio types to desecrate their childhood memories while at the same time wringing every last penny out of the self same hypocrites who'll end up watching it anyway just say they can bitch about it on internet forums.
Anyway, Nicolas Cage doesn't believe in all that shit. Neither does Edward Malus, for that's who our glorious hero plays in this film. He's a California Highway patrolman, one of those sexy ones like Ponch (not Jon). A woman and her daughter are involved in a horrendous traffic accident and despite Edwards best efforts they die before his very eyes in the flaming coffin of their station wagon. During his recovery from the ordeal Edward receives a mysterious letter, a voice from the past telling him about the tragic case of a missing girl. As the author of the letter is none other than his long lost love, he feels some sort of moral obligation to her, to help her find her missing daughter.
The search however is made extremely difficult when on arrival at the mysterious Summersisle he finds everyone there is a fucking mentalist. The island seems to be entirely populated by haggard washer women left over from ITV Dickens productions and some of the chaps from Mumford and Sons. To make matters worse they're incredibly unhelpful, pissing off Edward no end. He's on medication, all these bitches are giving him shit and the little girl in the red coat from Don't Look Now is running round all over the place. Having had enough of their bullshit he launches an investigation, displaying scant regard for procedure, jurisdiction, probable cause or in fact any sort of legal grounding. Who needs shit like that when you're from normal society and they're a bunch of fucking hippy lesbian plant munchers.
Edward declares war, punching and karate kicking hordes of psychotic honey maidens, oftentimes dressed as a bear, running wildly from house to house, searching for the missing girl. His frantic race to find the girl is made even more difficult by two things:
1 - the following day they're going to burn the little girl to death.
2 - the bees. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGHGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!! The BEEES! The fucking bees.
See, there's bees everywhere. The entire island is dedicated to the production of honey, which quite naturally means there's bees everyfuckingwhere. Which is a bit of a problem for Edward as he's allergic to bees. And the bees on this island are nasty little pricks and keep at him. They almost kill him twice in fact but both times he's brought back to life by the people who are trying to kill him, so that they can kill him later presumably. Between the killer bees and the seemingly never ending waves of crusties in silly animal hats the odds prove insurmountable for our brave hero and he comes face to face with the horrible truth that lies inside the crotch of THE WICKER MAN.
If I was to offer the the opinion I had of The Wicker Man after seeing it for the first time at the age of 14 back in 1986, a full 20 years before the unintentionally hilarious Nicolas Cage remake was unleashed on an unsuspecting world, it would be very different to the one I have now.
ReplyDeleteI still remember asking my father if I could set up our old Akai VCR to record it from ITV one night, and him readily agreeing, mainly because he was fully aware it contained lots of gratuitous nudity and Britt Ekland's bottom (we were only to find out her lovely bottom was actually somebody else's lovely bottom a few years later).
I watched it on my own in the daytime during the school holidays while my parents were at work and wasn't really prepared for what I was seeing. Most of the horror films I had watched up to that point had featured monsters, vampires, werewolves, zombies, masked psycho killers, or other such straightforward nasty things. They certainly didn't feature a wild-haired Christopher Lee prancing around in a tweed jacket, or off-putting folk songs which seemed to invade the soundtrack every five minutes. In fact, by the time the film's big secret had been revealed, I'd had more than enough of the aran jumper wearing, pipe smoking fishermen type, and the Foster and Allen living nightmare I had been subjected to for over an hour.
Sometimes you can just be too young to appreciate a film properly.
I look at it now with a different pair of eyes (metaphorically speaking, of course), after having seen far more traditional British horror films over the years, and after watching The Wicker Man itself at least once every three years since the first time.
Yes, even though I didn't like it to begin with, it had somehow stealthily crept into my subconscious and every now and again would tell me I had to watch it the next time it was on TV. Which I did. Every time.
From not really "getting" it, I steadily grew to appreciate it and then over time, love it. Twenty seven years on and it's an old friend now, a film I repeatedly go back to if I want something a little less obvious than hockey masked virgin murderers or knife wielding lunatics.
I love this, but I have no idea who wrote this.
Deletegary.alcock2@virgin.net
DeleteWhy The Wickerman is my favourite travel documentary.
ReplyDeleteI recall a time as a younger man, dancing, frolicking, sacrificing, there wasn’t a bee in sight and Summerisle was a lovely part of the world. However, all this wicker didn’t come cheap, particularly in the 70s when every home had its fair share of woven basket chairs and uncomfortable, immediately dated sofas. I felt it was up to me to make a change, a change for the better with the future of this fair island at its heart. So I did the only thing I could in this harsh time, I joined the Tourism initiative. As a member of the Summerisle travel and tourism board we created this informative feature length documentary to advertise the wonders of the island that the everyday, non-ritualistic folk were missing out on. This feature is responsible for a 400% rise in visitors to the island, a 200% increase in souvenir sales and a 150% rise in sacrificial giant wooden man burnings.
The infamous final scene involving the ‘burning’, was actually Jeff’s idea. Jeff had encouraged a partnership to be made with Summerisle and Moscow as part of an international pairing scheme. What better way to link the two than with an attempt to create the largest Russian Doll in history. A man inside the man to represent our Russian counterparts and a ceremonial burning to symbolise our small, friendly and welcoming community. Four years later, Jeff was made Mayor of Summerisle and rightly so. However he lost the position through scandal after it was released he was involved in mass testosterone fuelled orgies every full moon. What can I say, we were all doing it but his wife really didn’t appreciate his style of leadership.
So in the end, we sacrificed one actor to save an entire Island. It was all for the greater good and if he was here now, I’m sure Edward Woodward would would agree would….would.
thomasellis1123@hotmail.co.uk
I love the Wicker Man because it is only in this movie and with the magnificent performance of Sir Christopher Lee that a yellow turtleneck and tweed jacket can contribute to one of the most genuinely terrifying images in cinematic history.
ReplyDeletej.partridge@gmail.com
The Wicker Man was the first film I saw at film school. Before then I thought that film analysis was all very serious and understanding a film at its roots was a hard and academic task not to be taken lightly.
ReplyDeleteOn arrival at my first class I was greeted by an eccentric man in his late fifties with floppy grey hair and tweed trousers that rose so high at the ankle that the tops of his socks were visible. As he proceeded to show us The Wicker Man, he paused the film every few minutes and laughed hysterically at the absurdity of the plot, but this was not mocking, he was actually revelling in all of its quirks and crazy imagery. A very serious class all slowly began to embrace the film and understand that it was a great spectacle and although somewhat dated, this was to be celebrated. I felt I had made a connection with the film and the study of film that day, until the scene where Britt Ekland begins to dance up against the wall. As had been customary, the lecturer paused the film and laughed hysterically at the scene before providing us his own rendition up against the classroom wall. Him mimicked her sensuous dance in horrific fashion before turning to me and asking if I would go outside and play the role of Edward Woodward on the other side of the wall.
Me: "But no-one will be able to see me?"
Lecturer: "That doesn't matter, just see if you can feel anything. Imagine what was going through the characters mind during this dance."
I ventured out into a busy college corridor and stood with my back against the wall whilst, I can only imagine, the lecturer sexually seduced me from the other side. After a minute or two he popped his flustered head out of the door and asked me to return to class. I entered, the class were stoney faced and that was my introduction to film studies and The Wicker Man. A haunting tale both on screen and in class which made me realise that studying film is about enjoying film in all its crazy glory.
mrknight13@hotmail.com