1973 • United Kingdom
Sunshine, singing, corn dollies and the sort of island welcome that makes you miss the mainland police station. In this episode of Folk ’n’ Hell, Andy Davidson, Dave Houghton and David Hall head to Summer Isle for Robin Hardy’s The Wicker Man (1973), a film so central to folk horror that arguing about whether it counts feels a bit like debating whether a maypole is secretly quite phallic. Which, in this case, it probably is.
Andy comes to this one with no pretence of neutrality. It is his favourite film, one of the unholy trinity, and the episode carries the energy of a man trying very hard not to simply build a small shrine to Edward Woodward and Christopher Lee on the podcast table. Dave is warmer than he expected to be on this viewing, especially about the film’s bright, strange confidence and the way it lets the horror sit politely in the corner until the final, awful turn. David likes it too, but with reservations. Fifty years on, he finds the folk horror machinery fascinating, while not quite sharing Andy’s full sacrificial enthusiasm. “The Wicker Man is the kind of base... the cornerstone of folk horror.” FolknHell host, Dave Houghton
The discussion circles the film’s oddness: a musical that is also a mystery, a horror film that spends most of its time in daylight, and a pagan community whose beliefs may be ancient, Victorian, invented, sincere, cynical, or all of the above. The hosts dig into Howie’s rigid Christianity, Summer Isle’s fertility rites, the use of masks, the film’s many cuts, Christopher Lee’s magnificence, and the peculiar power of an ending everyone knows and yet which still feels like a trap closing.
Sergeant Neil Howie, a devout Christian policeman from the mainland, travels to the remote Scottish island of Summer Isle to investigate the disappearance of a young girl, Rowan Morrison. Once there, he finds a community that seems cheerfully determined to obstruct him. The locals deny Rowan existed, then admit she did, then surround him with songs, innuendo, rituals, classroom oddities, fertility symbols and a general air of smiling refusal.
Howie’s investigation becomes less a search than a collision between belief systems. He sees pagan corruption everywhere. The islanders see him as something much more useful: a man whose own moral certainty may lead him exactly where they want him to go.
Yes. Even when the hosts poke at the edges, The Wicker Man comes out not merely as folk horror, but as one of the genre’s great load-bearing beams. It has the isolated community, the landscape, the old or old-ish belief system, the clash between modern authority and ritual life, and a sacrifice waiting at the end like the worst possible village fête attraction.
The interesting disagreement is not whether it qualifies, but how cleanly it fits. David questions the “ancient” part of the equation, pointing out that Summer Isle’s paganism is only a few generations old within the film, and arguably built from Victorian romantic ideas of older customs. Andy and Dave accept the complication, but argue that the film still draws on older traditions, fertility rites, sacrifice, folk song and invented ritual with enough conviction to make the island’s belief system feel completely lived in. “Their intent is horrific... and as a consequence, the ending is horrific.” FolknHell host, David Hall
It may be light on conventional horror for much of its running time, but the hosts agree that the intent is horrific all along. Everyone on Summer Isle knows the shape of the trap except Howie. That makes the songs, the smiles and the sunny hillsides feel much nastier in retrospect.
- Belief as a weapon Howie’s Christianity and Summer Isle’s paganism are both treated as systems of certainty. The horror comes from what people will do when they believe the ritual justifies the damage.
- The musical as folk horror engine The songs are not decoration. They are part of the island’s social machinery, making the place feel communal, seductive and faintly ridiculous before the cruelty becomes clear.
- Invented tradition, real consequences The hosts enjoy the wrinkle that Summer Isle’s customs may be revived, reconstructed or outright manipulated. Whether ancient or not, everyone behaves as if the ritual matters, which is all the film needs.
- Masks and dehumanisation David is especially taken with the animal masks, which instantly turn the villagers from eccentric locals into a collective ritual force. It is hard to negotiate with a poodle-headed mob.
- Sunlight instead of shadows Dave notes how bright and idyllic the film looks. The lack of obvious horror trappings makes the final turn feel stranger, as if the whole island has been calmly humming towards murder in broad daylight.
- Howie’s fatal righteousness The islanders test Howie repeatedly, and his own rigidity keeps him on the path. He is victim, investigator, martyr and, in the most dreadful sense, volunteer.
The hosts agree that The Wicker Man is folk horror, and not just folk horror adjacent with a hobbyist interest in maypoles. It remains one of the defining films of the genre, even if its musical oddness, comic moments and 1970s textures may land differently for newer viewers.
Andy gives it a full 10, openly and without shame, because this is his favourite film and some obsessions are too old to be reasoned with. Dave gives it an 8, finding more to admire this time than on a previous viewing, particularly in the way the film’s bright surfaces conceal its sacrificial machinery. David lands at 6.5, admiring it as folk horror but less convinced of it as a film when measured against what has followed.
So yes, recommended, but with the warning that it is less a conventional fright machine than a sunny, singing trap. Bring an open mind, avoid the local festival, and do not trust anyone offering you a costume.
How each host rated this film