Despite not being the greatest advert for the Scottish tourist board The Wicker Man is a film that has brought fans from all over the world on a pilgrimage to the Dumfries and Galloway locations it was filmed in. Rightly so, as The Wicker Man isn't just one of the greatest British horror films ever made, it is one of the greatest films ever made full stop, and in a career spanning nearly 70 years and over 275 films Christopher Lee still considers it the best film he ever appeared in. As part of a short lived genre that Mark Gatiss termed "folk horror" alongside Michael Reeve's The Witchfinder General and Blood On Satan's Claw, The Wicker Man remains a unique experience. This despite endless parodies and homages, Neal LaBute's lamentable attempt to remake it with Nicholas Cage and director Robin Hardy's thematic follow-up The Wicker Tree, which was released in 2012. A third part of Hardy's Wicker trilogy Twilight Of The Gods is expected to surface in the next couple of years, whether it can recreate some of the original's magic formula remains to be seen, though it's Shetland setting could go some way towards evoking Sergeant Howie's ill fated "appointment with the Wicker Man". Any Caledonian classic you feel should have made the list? Tell us below:
As well as the odd article, I apply my "special mind" to scriptwriting for Comics, Films and Games... Oh and I cut down trees, I skip and jump, I like to press wild flow'rs, I put on women's clothing, and hang around in bars.
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