The Wicker Man (1973)

Wicker Man is Robin Hardy’s 1973 original, chronicling the tale of a police officer Neil Howie as he ventures into the remote Island or Hebridean, Summerisle, in hopes of discovering the whereabouts of a little girl among an island of freakish individuals, to say the least. Although usually physiological thrillers, may lack the jump out of your seat moments, but they make up for it by leaving you with a bone chilling sensation that haunts you to you down to the core, such in the likes of Silence of the Lambs and Rosemary’s baby, but in this film it offer you neither jump out of your seat moments or bone chilling sensations, instead all it offers you is a snail’s paced building climax, along the way filling your ears with pointless sing and dance numbers that even High School Musical would be embarrassed to have, although the only aspect I did find terrifying was the way the town folk where so heavily brainwashed that they lost all sense of individual thought or morality and behaved almost zombie like. Although the twist at the end wasn't actually that bad and slightly makes up for the boring precursor. What I also found annoying in The Wicker Man was the outrageously, sinfully bad dubbing that was extremely distracting and cringe inducing. The main character was also rather infuriating, I found him irritating and difficult to empathise with; although rather gallant in the face of a group of people seem to not to care about the disappearance of a little girl. What annoyed me most about him was the fact that during the earlier parts of the film, he rides into town he has never been before, upon his high horse and believing just because he is part of the law he automatically achieves almost god like status among the town folk, and uses it as an excuse to constantly speak to them through snide remarks and impatient demands. It seems the internet is filled with admirers of this horror flick, but I cease to find the charm in this lacklustre bore fest. I strongly beg you not to waste your time watching it; you will probably find more scares in an episode of Goose bumps, than you would in this mess. But on a positive note, at least it’s better than the American 2006 remake.