Just over fifty years ago The Wicker Man (1973) was released. Now widely seen as one of the great horrors of its era, its release was a commercial failure, and it would struggle to find acclaim for many years. It’s a story that matches many of our most beloved horrors, but what does such initial failure do to the people behind the film and their family?
This is at the centre of Children of the Wicker Man, a reckoning of a director’s place amongst their peers as well as their personal lives. We go on a journey with Justin and Dominic, the sons of director Robin Hardy, as they explore his lost papers and get to know a man they both barely knew and understood in his lifetime. The film chronicles the gestation and filming of The Wicker Man, as well as the aftermath of it. But it also explores the man behind the movie.
A surprisingly bitter experience, this documentary is no love letter to the film at its centre. Alongside testament to the craft behind The Wicker Man are the realities of a creative who seems compelled to burn down every bridge open to him. From leaving families behind saddled with crippling debt to falling out with the industry figures who go out on a limb to support him, Robin Hardy posthumously endears himself to no one. As Justin and Dominic grapple with the why behind their father’s actions, we as an audience are left perplexed too.
Children of the Wicker Man is a far more powerful watch than the usual documentary treatment that cult films receive. The personal angle of those behind it gives the film such profound weight that I found myself close to tears on a new of occasions. In its own way it feels like a repudiation of the genius auteur, the man (and its always a man) allowed to break the people around him because of the work they are creating. And yet, by the film’s climax the Hardy brothers allow some admiration to seep back into their film for their father.
Their documentary is compelling and complicated, likely to linger longer than you expect. It is no love letter to The Wicker Man, despite such remarkable access to the film’s own story, and is all the better for it.
4 Screams out of 5.
Comments