WICKER MAN BURNS!I was sad to see all the negative reviews of Neil LaBute's Wicker Man remake. I thought the trailer looked quite classy and interesting, but it seems the movie is a bit of a mess. I liked the idea of altering the original's "Pagan vs Christianity" allegory, to a "Man vs Woman" device, with a sinister matriarchy headed by the wonderful Ellen Burstyn. It seemed this would be enough of a change to make for an interesting revival of the story for a new generation.
But it seems Neil LaBute seriously dropped the ball. I haven't seen the film myself so I'll reserve judgment for now, but I'm interested to see how bad it apparently is. Mark Kermode said the filmmakers seemed to realize just how slow and mood-setting the story actually is, so decided to shoehorn in some pointless action set-pieces all over the place. If true, it's a classic case of studio interference, I think.
In the age of the "MTV fast-edit", there are less films that just take their time to build their characters, premise and atmosphere. I dread to think what a Shining remake would look like these days, but I think there'd be psychic visions every ten minutes, multiple spooky ghosts and probably a finale involving the Overlook blowing up in Michael Bay-esque slo-mo.
The original 1973 Wicker Man is now a recognized cult classic, but it's certainly a product of its time. It's often very slow and ponderous, but with a suffocating air of uneasiness throughout. The finale regularly graces Top 100 Scary Moments polls, and it's definitely the main reason the film is held in such high esteem over 30 years later. It had a devastating ending, and we don't get many downbeat endings in cinema (particularly these days).
A remake could have worked brilliantly. Enough time has passed, and the original isn't common knowledge to most moviegoers. By relocating to America and altering the islander's modus operandi, I though the filmmakers had cleverly managed to tweak the concept just enough to be a worthwhile venture. Nobody wants an exact duplicate of the original with better visuals and production design (even Dawn Of The Dead's remake made the zombies faster and completely rewrote the characters). No, we want something fresh, but recognizable and in-keeping with its predecessor. Basically, something that doesn't devalue the original.
The best example of a remake is a toss-up between Cronenberg's The Fly (1986) and Carpenter's The Thing (1982). Both took silly 50's sci-fi hokum and transformed it into startling cinema just by treating the premise seriously. Those directors recognized the greatness within these old films, and saw a potential the original filmmakers couldn't realize. So maybe that's where Wicker Man 06 went wrong: the original was already great to begin with, so it didn't need a remake. It may be considered an "old film" now, but it never squandered its potential like the first Ocean's Eleven, for example.
Maybe lessons will be learned from Wicker Man's failure? Ha! I doubt it. More and more remakes are being made each year it seems. We've already had Poseidon and The Omen in cinemas, with both proving to be pointless retreads. Still, I'm sure both were profitable for the studios, or will be once the DVD sales figures come in.
