Nicolas Cage stars inThe Wicker Manas a traumatized police officer investigating a lost girl on a mysterious, mist-shrouded island of imperious women and dimwitted men. Summoned by his ex-fiancee (Kate Beahan,Flightplan, who seems to have borrowed her lips from Angelina Jolie), Edward Malus (Cage,Adaptation.) blusters his way into a closed religious community by flashing his out-of-state badge around and insulting everyone he meets. To describeThe Wicker Manany further would deprive viewers of enjoying the staggering ineptness of this absurd remake of the fairly creepy 1973 original. Despite a talented cast (including Ellen Burstyn,Requiem for a Dream, Molly Parker,Deadwood, and Leelee Sobieski,Joy Ride), the performances are uniformly awful, with Cage leading the pack; his overwrought cries of "How'd it get burned?!?" will provoke barks of laughter. Arbitrary wierdness abounds--ranging from animal masks to a body-stocking of bees--in a flailing effort to distract the audience from the narrative running madly off the rails. Maybe writer/director Neil LaBute (In the Company of Men,The Shape of Things) aspired to create a fever dream of male fears about women, but the result is a deformed hybrid ofInvasion of the Bee GirlsandThe Village. A future camp classic.--Bret Fetzer
Nicholas Cage should be ashamed! I haven't seen the original but rented this movie because Cage is the star. It was awful! The only good thing was the beautiful scenery.
Not great, but not totally worthless I must say right off the bat that I've not seen the original upon which this remake is based so I had the luxury of not comparing the two while watching the 2006 version of The Wicker Man.
No, this is not a great movie, but on the other side of that, it's nowhere close to the worst that I've seen either. Cage chews the scenery so much that much of his performance is laughable, but at the same time I couldn't turn away. The movie kept me engaged and curious to see it though to the end. While I've not seen the original film, I am aware of the climax of that movie and was curious to see if the newer version would carry through.
Go in with the purpose to be entertained and The Wicker Man will deliver; just don't dwell upon it too much after its over.Just Didn't Get It I have never seen the original, so I didn't watch this one with any expectations or anything else to compare it to. This movie is terrible. It is not a horror at all. It dances back and forth between being a supernatural experience, and a simple drama, without ever explaining. The movie is boring. Not once did it compel me, excite me, scare me, or give me any reason to sit there and watch. Cage is fair in the movie, but no one really stands out. Bascially a quick summary of the movie is that a cop goes to a strange island run by pagan feminists looking for his girlfriend's missing child. Lot of strange images, fast forward to a crappy ending and role credits. The shocking ending isn't that shocking. I saw the twist coming a half hour into the picture. The dvd ending is very unsatisfying. I am going to go rent the original. It has to be better.
