The Wicker Man (and another hit from the early 70s)

[Eirik]

A month or two ago some of you helped me id the Wicker Man - which I had seen as a kid - and someone asked me to pass along my thoughts when I finally tracked it down...  I found the theatrical widescreen DVD in a nearby video store and watched it yesterday.  

First off, I really really enjoyed it and found it to be very scary in a crreping, uncertain kind of way.  The performances were great across the board.  The towns folk were utterly bizarre and had me laughing at points.  The script/story was also pretty brilliant.  I highly recommend this movie.  

The slow build up to the climactic scene actually had my adreneline going a little.  This is the best horror movie I have seen in a while - and yes, I classify it as horror and not mystery (which is where it was in the video store).  The mystery itself was just a tool to build horror and I'm not one to define horror as only that involving the supernatural.

One thing that was a little weird is that seeing it didn't jog any other memories outside the few scenes I vaguely recalled.  Makes me think I only saw a couple of scenes and didn't watch the whole thing as a kid.

Since I was at the video store I also picked up another early 70s movie that I have heard referred to by some as a classic - Last House on the Left.  Thoroughly cheesey, horribly acted, and gartuitous - I didn't like it at all and found myself fast forwarding through most of it.  It also wins the award for most incongruous end credits I have ever seen.  Basically the movie is about a girl who is kidnapped and horribly brutalized and murdered by thugs who then find themselves in the clutches of her parents and subjected to brutal revenge.  The end credits has this corny upbeat 70's tune and does that TV style credits where the actors name comes up on the screen while they show a clip of them in the movie.  The credits made the movie seem like it was an After School Special about a girl's first prom or something and it follows right after a scene where her mother bites off some guy's genitals.  Unbeleivable.

[Menard]

THE WICKER MAN is absolutely hilarious. A lot of people classify it a terrifying horror film, but I found it to be filled with humor rather than horror. I guess it depends on perspective.

[Eirik]

Oh I agree there were some very very funny scenes - and intentionally funny at that - but I also found it genuinely scary.

One of the things that the film did so well is that it used both humor and eroticism to actually add to the scariness.  Usually those elements are introduced to a horror film as a sort of apology for lack of scariness, but not here.

[Scott]

Both films are very good ! THE WICKER MAN  is one of my favorite about that pagan island community and LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT is a disturbing little film that must be seen.

[AndyC]

Love the Wicker Man. Delightfully creepy, with that folksy style that could only have come from the early 70s. Great story, with a fantastic ending, and good performances by both Woodward and Lee.

When my wife suggested Rowan as a name for a future daughter, I readily agreed. Naturally, I'll tell people we named her after the kid in this movie.

One thing that strikes me as funny, watching the movie so many years later, is watching a story in which Edward Woodward plays a deadly serious fellow who responds to a desperate plea for help. I just imagine him showing up on the island and doing his badass Equalizer routine.

[BoyScoutKevin]

While not a success when first released, it has become something of a cult classic, and is also now regarded as being one of the better horror films from the '70's.

I have yet to see it. Maybe that is why I'm looking forward to seeing the remake. Though, I usually make it a point not to watch remakes of older films. Instead of occuring off the coast of Scotland, the remake now occurs off the coast of Maine with Nicholas Cage to appear in the Edward Woodward. role. What may make this more then a sucky remake is that the writer/director is Neil "Nurse Betty" LaBute.