RadixJournal - November 06, 2026


The Wicker Man

The Odyssey： 17-20

Episode Stats


Length

14 minutes

Words per minute

128.55

Word count

1,928

Sentence count

79

Harmful content

Misogyny

1

sentences flagged

Toxicity

10

sentences flagged

Hate speech

2

sentences flagged


Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 all right so i am just gonna do this on my phone using my airpods so the sound will not be as great
00:00:11.300 but there it is um okay so i was planning we could have a breezy discussion of the wicker man
00:00:22.820 on halloween it is a very fun movie at least i find it fun i have seen it a number of times
00:00:31.080 and it doesn't get old um it is very very entertaining and you know some people have
00:00:39.140 called it the citizen cane of horror movies maybe that is going a little bit far but it is the
00:00:47.080 Citizen Kane of horror movies in the sense that it's clearly a low-budget film. It had a
00:00:52.560 tortured production, but it packs a punch. It is a very compelling horror film, and it's
00:01:02.580 very unique as well. Now, it's inspired some other movies, many of which we've discussed,
00:01:09.540 like Midsommar and others.
00:01:13.280 But it has just a unique vibe.
00:01:17.240 Christopher Lee, it has a sort of joyous sexual quality to it.
00:01:24.460 And I've just always really enjoyed this movie.
00:01:28.960 And I imagine that in terms of its depiction of paganism,
00:01:34.940 that Mark will have some criticisms of it
00:01:38.940 or a sense that it's being a little bit incoherent.
00:01:45.340 But regardless, I think it brings up
00:01:48.200 some interesting discussion points
00:01:50.220 on Christianity and paganism, et cetera, et cetera.
00:01:54.620 So I'll just do a very brief introduction.
00:01:57.540 So it is directed by Robin Hardy.
00:02:00.460 The writers are very interesting.
00:02:03.780 So that includes Anthony Schaeffer,
00:02:05.920 who is most famous for his play Amadeus
00:02:11.720 that became a film in the 1980s about Mozart, of course.
00:02:17.060 And I believe it was won multiple Academy Awards
00:02:21.560 and it has survived to us in the form of memes,
00:02:25.500 which is saying something.
00:02:28.580 There is a credit to David Pinner who wrote a,
00:02:32.560 I believe a play and then a novel that is vaguely about a Christian detective
00:02:40.920 going to a pagan community and so on but he I think he inspired many of the elements but
00:02:49.700 the story for The Whipperman is unique and it is done by Anthony Schaeffer so some very
00:02:59.920 interesting things. Christopher Lee plays Lord Summerisle. And he, of course, made a name for
00:03:10.300 himself as a horror movie villain playing Dracula or various other bad figures, monsters. And he
00:03:22.280 He wanted to break the mold.
00:03:26.780 He wanted to avoid typecasting
00:03:28.580 and so was seeking out more nuanced
00:03:33.280 and complex and dramatic roles.
00:03:36.160 And I think he found one,
00:03:37.460 although he still plays a bit of a monster.
00:03:41.360 And Britt Eklund plays Willow.
00:03:44.180 And they, you know, it's funny,
00:03:47.420 Britt Eklund and Christopher Lee in 1973
00:03:50.000 were also co-stars in The Man with the Golden Gun,
00:03:54.560 a James Bond film.
00:03:57.360 And it's, anyway, I don't know what to make of that exactly.
00:04:03.600 It might just be an interesting coincidence.
00:04:08.160 Edward Woodward plays Sergeant Mowey, 0.79
00:04:11.240 the Christian who has been assigned
00:04:15.340 to investigate this community on Summer Isle
00:04:19.160 for a missing girl of course we learn later that the lord summers summer isle and the rest of the
00:04:27.540 citizens are bringing him there for other purposes uh there are a number other great
00:04:36.000 character actors involved in this diane salento as miss rose um a number of people who show up
00:04:45.480 and some Kubrick films, I've noticed.
00:04:48.480 But those are the main players.
00:04:50.780 And as I said, the plot, it's a very simple film.
00:04:54.940 It basically takes place in one setting.
00:04:59.580 Now, I don't know which version you watched at home.
00:05:03.620 There was an original theatrical cut,
00:05:06.620 and then there was a director's cut,
00:05:09.640 and then a final cut.
00:05:11.960 And the production was a bit tortured,
00:05:16.500 but that often happens with good movies.
00:05:18.960 There was a threat of a labor strike,
00:05:21.320 and so they filmed this movie in just a few days
00:05:24.920 or a few weeks during February.
00:05:28.300 And so they were freezing cold
00:05:31.460 while they were outside naked,
00:05:33.620 frolicking or jumping over fires.
00:05:37.160 Then the studio wanted a happy ending,
00:05:40.440 and they had to kind of fight for the shocking ending
00:05:43.880 of Sergeant Howie being burned.
00:05:46.380 And many other things, a lot of the footage was lost
00:05:49.200 and there's a campaign to recreate it,
00:05:52.840 to release the director's cut of The Wicker Man,
00:05:56.600 which they did, and they even improved it still
00:05:59.800 with this final cut that is available.
00:06:03.380 It's available on iTunes and some other places.
00:06:06.620 and it doesn't change the movie fundamentally but it um it the movie happens over two nights
00:06:15.360 as opposed to one there is a scene where lord summer isle introduces one of the buchanan boys
00:06:23.060 i think ash buchanan and he says a sacrifice to venus and he's talking about willow the innkeeper's
00:06:30.880 daughter who's up in her second floor room and he basically sends a teenage boy to go 0.81
00:06:36.320 have sex with willow to learn the ways of love uh apparently it you know a a bit shocking maybe to
00:06:46.920 for modern audiences who are obsessed with age gap relationships and seeking out pedophiles but 0.96
00:06:55.840 But anyway, probably all good fun for most healthy people.
00:07:01.260 The movie is not substantially fundamentally changed, but it is different.
00:07:06.320 And I did find it better watching the final cut that has been reconstructed decades later.
00:07:15.880 And, you know, just a little bit of background in the sense of paganism and Christianity.
00:07:24.300 You have Sergeant Howie saying, you know, I am all I care about is the law. And, you know, sir, you live in a Christian country and these lines like that.
00:07:36.200 You know, remember that I think Sergeant Howie would have been a little bit out of step in 1973, Britain or Scotland.
00:07:48.360 He is a devout Christian.
00:07:52.200 He's depicted as a Anglican, Episcopalian, I guess.
00:07:58.600 But this is all post-sexual revolution.
00:08:03.100 And I think in some ways it's trying to deal with that trauma of the 1960s and introducing sex to society and decriminalizing homosexuality and drugs and rock and roll and all that stuff.
00:08:25.200 So I think that is an interesting, you know, historical background that should be kept in mind when analyzing the film.
00:08:35.780 But it seems that, so Lord Summerisle describes himself as a heathen, but an enlightened one.
00:08:42.700 And the religion they seem to be following is something like Germanic paganism, although they evoke the Greek gods as well in multiple instances.
00:08:58.820 uh it is a bit of a mishmash and and people who have looked skeptically at both this film and
00:09:07.200 the golden bow the major book that was used as a resource for it they see a lot of these customs
00:09:16.460 as perhaps coming celtic paganism especially yeah yes and is that what you said maybe that's
00:09:24.440 what you said i think you said germanic but celtic celtic pagan i should have said celtic
00:09:28.800 yes um they see a lot of these traditions is perhaps even coming from the middle ages
00:09:34.900 and there is an evoke there's an evocation of the druids with the man woman uh who lord
00:09:43.260 summer isle performs uh now there there is evocations of some things that are quite ancient 0.95
00:09:49.200 but maybe not originating in britain um the fool as a king for a day there's a
00:09:57.540 saturnalian quality to this mayday festival um the wicker man itself was described by none other 0.92
00:10:07.180 than julius caesar in his memoirs of his gallic campaigns he talked about these giant wicker men
00:10:15.580 figures that were set aflame so long story short there is a bit of a mishmash going on with
00:10:24.080 paganism and i'm sure that mark will you know maybe take issue here there obviously we're not
00:10:30.260 demanding historical accuracy here this is a a entertaining movie but uh there i'm sure that
00:10:36.560 there is something um of interest to talk about in the sort of inaccurate ways that they depicted
00:10:44.040 paganism um but you know just to sum up the plot a bit the the town are all confederates
00:10:53.300 against Sergeant Howie. 0.94
00:10:56.260 They're playing dumb, making fun of him, 0.99
00:11:00.240 snickering behind his back, et cetera, et cetera. 0.99
00:11:03.500 And then at the end of the film,
00:11:06.620 it is fully revealed the plot.
00:11:09.220 So he's searching for a missing girl.
00:11:11.480 Well, the missing girl has been found
00:11:13.460 and she hasn't just been hidden away.
00:11:15.600 She is in on it too.
00:11:17.500 And no, they are not going to sacrifice the missing girl.
00:11:21.140 They're going to sacrifice him.
00:11:22.420 He is a man of the law and thus a king of sorts. 0.99
00:11:26.840 So he's sort of the fool as a king for the day 0.96
00:11:29.540 in an interesting way as a police inspector. 1.00
00:11:32.600 He is a virgin because he does not believe
00:11:35.760 in sex before marriage.
00:11:37.180 And he's actually tested at one point where Willow,
00:11:43.620 named after a tree as they all are,
00:11:46.940 who clearly wants to get with Sergeant Howie at night.
00:11:51.460 She's gotten with everyone else in the town. 1.00
00:11:53.580 I mean, need some fresh blood.
00:11:55.900 But he refuses.
00:11:58.620 And, you know, he says, it's nothing personal.
00:12:00.880 I don't believe in it.
00:12:02.720 And then there's this revelation with Lord Summerisle at the end of the film.
00:12:08.220 And there's an interesting, and I think genuinely horrifying, you know, to use that word properly.
00:12:16.340 It gives you chills.
00:12:18.540 There's a sense of revelation.
00:12:21.460 And about, A, what they're doing to him, but B, that on some ironic level, this is a kind of Christian ceremony, that he's being burned alive, but he is now given a martyr's death, something quite rare these days, as Lord Summerisle says.
00:12:43.660 and he will join the the saints up in heaven afterward and um and then sergeant howie
00:12:52.420 he he has a retort to lord summer isle which is also quite powerful which is that you know your
00:12:58.660 ancestors came to this island it wasn't and it had volcanic ash and was suitable to growing these
00:13:06.160 amazing fruits but actually you you shouldn't have been farming this way here it's not natural
00:13:13.860 and you're going to have another bad harvest and next year they're going to sacrifice you
00:13:19.460 and you know how he's an interesting character because he's he's uptight uh a bit of a
00:13:25.880 a bit self-righteous but i i think he is a very sympathetic character i mean after all he's
00:13:33.680 a sincere believer and after all he is searching for a kidnapped or dead child i mean he's doing
00:13:41.480 his job um and you know when he says those words to lord summeryle he might be right
00:13:48.120 and so i i do think that there's a a horror terror quality to the ending that goes beyond just
00:13:56.460 the terrifying aspect of imagining being burned alive
00:14:00.980 to the sounds of flaming cows and chickens,
00:14:04.940 you know, and all those things.
00:14:07.280 So I think it's a great film.
00:14:10.600 I love it.
00:14:11.640 I enjoy re-watching it.
00:14:14.420 And hopefully it will bring up some interesting issues
00:14:19.220 about Christianity and paganism.
00:14:21.380 But I think that sets the scene pretty well, I think, Mark.
00:14:26.460 yeah no it's it's a great uh intro great description of the film i'm only learning
00:14:35.020 now that the director is jewish i haven't known that the last few times that we've reviewed this
00:14:39.260 film um yeah so it's and i don't know that it's a case of gem as it were um but there might be
00:14:47.540 some things that are suggestive um when you look at it in a deeper way and had i known that he was
00:14:54.640 Jewish, I probably would have looked at it in a closer way, more with this sort of ram
00:14:58.880 of magnifying glass. 0.95