From Cult Classic to Cautionary Tale: How The Wicker Man and Its Remake Went Up in Flames

Every so often I revisit a classic and, against my better judgment, follow it up with the remake everyone warns me about. That was me with The Wicker Man. I rewatched the 1973 original, then finally sat down with the 2006 version. Should I have taken the hint from the bees memes? Absolutely.

How a quirky book deal led to a masterpiece... and a disaster

Back in 1966, a young writer named David Pinner published a comedic vampire novel called Fanghorn. Right after that, he started work on a folk-horror comedy called Ritual. In 1971 he sold the screen rights to former spy, heavy metal baritone, and all-around legend Christopher Lee. That deal eventually set up two very different outcomes: one of the best horror films ever made (1973’s The Wicker Man) and, decades later, one of the worst remakes to ever get greenlit (hi, 2006).

Remakes live on that spectrum where the original’s greatness can make a bad redo feel even worse. The Fog used to be my go-to example of that problem. Then I revisited The Wicker Man. New champion crowned.

The remake that kept trying to happen

The Wicker Man had been floating around remake talks since the early 90s. At one point Christopher Lee was set to reunite with original director Robin Hardy and Vanessa Redgrave for a sort-of-remake called The Riding of the Laddie, where Lee would actually play the good guy. That fell apart, but the idea later mutated into Hardy’s spiritual sequel The Wicker Tree, which is... fine. Not essential.

The 2006 movie: a quick dossier

• Rights: Nicolas Cage’s Saturn Films picked them up in 2002.
• Distribution shuffle: Universal to Millennium, then Alcon via Warner Bros.
• Creative: Neil LaBute wrote and directed.
• Production: Shot July 2005 in Vancouver, Canada.
• Cast: Nicolas Cage, Ellen Burstyn, Leelee Sobieski, Molly Parker, Frances Conroy.
• Where Cage was at: post-Oscar, past the The Rock/Face/Off/Con Air run, but still mid-first-prime with The Weather Man, World Trade Center, and Lord of War.
• Horror bona fides then: basically 8MM; the later proof he could go full horror (Mandy, Color Out of Space) came afterward.

What the remake actually does

Nicolas Cage plays Edward, a cop haunted by a bad roadside accident. He gets a letter from his ex, claiming her daughter is missing on an isolated island off Washington. He heads there and runs smack into a neo-pagan community that stonewalls him at every turn. He learns the missing girl, Rowan, is actually his daughter. He spends the movie trying to find her, gets swarmed by bees, and then discovers he was just bait. He’s burned alive inside a giant wicker effigy so harvest season can get a mulligan. On paper, that could be chilling. In execution, it’s oddly flat.

Why the 1973 original still crushes

The original is tighter, stranger, and smarter. Christopher Lee, looking for meatier roles in the early 70s, teamed up with writer Anthony Shaffer and director Robin Hardy. They used the Ritual rights as a launchpad and built something unique: a sunlit folk musical-thriller that is quietly terrifying.

Edward Woodward plays Sergeant Howie, a devout Christian sent from the mainland to the island of Summerisle to investigate a missing girl named Rowan Morrison. The locals are disarmingly pleasant, a touch mocking, and completely uninterested in his moral outrage. Britt Ekland’s Willow attempts to seduce him; Ingrid Pitt pops up in the library; and Lee’s Lord Summerisle presides not as a cackling overlord but as a charismatic, almost egalitarian leader. Howie discovers the island embraced paganism under Summerisle’s ancestors and that last year’s crops failed. He fears Rowan was selected as a sacrifice. He rescues her... or so he thinks. The islanders reveal the real plan: he came willingly, holds authority, is a virgin, and fits their ritual like a glove. He dies in the Wicker Man as the community sings. No cavalry. No escape. Just the sun going down.

There are three versions of the original (theatrical, director’s cut, and the Final Cut). Take your pick, but the Final Cut is my go-to. No matter which one you choose, the spine of the movie is the same: a clash between Christianity and pagan belief, with Howie unshakeable in his faith and blind to the trap.

Where the remake stumbles (and keeps stumbling)

The 2006 movie copies the broad plot points but drains the meaning out of them. The biggest problem: it ties the protagonist to the island through his ex and a secret daughter. That breaks the clean, almost folkloric setup of the original. In 1973, Howie is there because he actually has jurisdiction and an anonymous summons; he knows no one and owes no one. In 2006, Edward has no legal authority and is emotionally entangled from minute one. It’s the same energy as retconning Michael Myers into Laurie’s brother: you think you’re adding stakes, but you shrink the myth instead.

Other choices don’t help. Edward flashes a gun and throws random kicks like he wandered in from another movie. The islanders at points feel like villagers out of Resident Evil 4, ready to brawl instead of lull you into dread. The cast is stacked, but the script gives them nothing: Ellen Burstyn’s Sister Summerisle becomes a thin, mustache-twirling foil, wasting what could have been a smart gender-flip read on power and faith. Compare that to Lee’s Lord Summerisle, who never floats above his people and even shows a flicker of doubt when Howie warns that, if the crops fail again, only Summerisle’s blood will do.

The score is off too. The remake leans loud and melodramatic, where the original’s sunnier folk tones make the horror creep in sideways. And the crucial piece goes missing: the movie never commits to a real faith-on-faith collision. There are a couple cuts of the remake, but none put Edward’s spirituality in the ring. Meanwhile, every version of the original is explicitly about a Christian walking into a pagan ritual with absolute certainty and losing on theological hubris as much as anything else.

Honestly, if you want a modern film that captures the original’s DNA without copying it, Midsommar is closer in spirit than the official remake ever gets.

The endings tell the story

Yes, the bees scene is as goofy as you’ve heard. But beyond the meme, the sacrifice doesn’t land because the movie hasn’t built a spiritual framework to make it land. When Edward yells 'Oh God,' it’s a generic plea. When Howie shouts 'Jesus Christ,' you feel it, because he’s calling to a savior he believes in as the flames go up and the islanders sing. The original lingers on that horror. It is physically awful and spiritually annihilating.

'Not the bees!'

So... what went wrong?

Just about everything that matters. You can make changes and still keep the soul of the thing. The 2006 version bulldozes the soul and swaps in louder music, clumsy action beats, and a backstory no one asked for. Great cast, wasted. Bold themes, deleted. Gorgeous setting, shot to look anonymous.

Final thoughts from someone who put this off for years

I avoided the remake for a long time. The original was my brother’s favorite, and he’s the reason I love horror the way I do. I finally watched the 2006 movie to see if the reputation was exaggerated. It isn’t. Maybe it had to be this bad so future remakes could learn what not to do. But if you care about harvests, let’s just say a prayer for good crops and leave the classic alone. The 1973 film doesn’t need saving. The remake needed more than bees.