The Wicker Man (1973)

Illustration by REY.

“Come,” says Lord Summerisle. “It is time to keep your appointment with the Wicker Man.” It’s an ominous line, spoken by a community leader convinced of his own righteousness. That blend of certainty and menace is the essence of British folk horror. The archetypal example of the genre, The Wicker Man sings of the twisted conflict between a strict social order—rooted in the soil, the seasons, and the old gods of the natural world—and the chilling end it brings to anyone who refuses to join its chorus. And yet, folk horror resists an easy definition. Scholars have spent decades arguing over its boundaries and whether it requires isolation, antiquity, ritual sacrifice, or simply a clash of irreconcilable worldviews. No consensus has emerged, only a loose association among films that feature outsiders colliding with fringe belief systems. Written by Anthony Shaffer and directed by Robin Hardy, The Wicker Man encapsulates this conflict better than most examples of the genre. After being dismissed on its initial run, it became one of the most exhaustively analyzed horror films ever made. And for a film so preoccupied with pagan rituals and communities that deliberately turned their backs on modernity, its themes still echo today. Its true subject is less about the enmity between paganism and Christianity specifically than the terrifying certainty of faith itself. That theme has lost none of its power or relevance since the film’s 1973 release.

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