THE WICKER MAN
Year: 2006
USA: Warner Bros Pictures
UK: Lionsgate Films UK
Cast: Nicolas Cage, Ellen Burstyn, Kate Beahan, Frances Conroy, Molly Parker, Leelee Sobieski, Diane Delano, Michael Wiseman, Erika Shaye Gair, Christa Campbell, Emily Holmes, Zemphira Gosling, Matthew Walker, Mary Black, Christine Willes, Sophie Hough, David Purvis, Xantha Radley, Tania Saulnier, Anna Van Hooft, Moraea Bieber, Jayda Bieber, Talia Ranger, Kendall Cross, Simon Longmore, Andre Danyliu, Jacqueline Robbins, Joyce Robbins, Aaron Eckhart, James Franco, Jason Ritter
Director: Neil LaBute
Countries: Germany / USA
USA: 97 mins
UK: 101 mins
USA Rated: PG-13 for disturbing images and violence, language and thematic issues
UK Certificate: 12A contains moderate horror, violence and one use of strong language
USA Release Date: 1 September 2006
UK Release Date: 31 August 2006
Synopsis
Out patrolling a California highway, police officer Edward Malus (Nicolas Cage) stops a station wagon to return a little girl's lost doll. Moments later, a runaway truck slams into the station wagon, igniting it into a fiery wreck with the mother and child trapped inside. Edward fails to save them before the car explodes ... and then spends months of his life choking down pills to get the image of their faces out of his head.
But Edward is about to get a second chance.
A desperate letter from his former fiancee, Willow (Kate Beahan), arrives at his home with no postmark. Willow came into his life and left just as unexpectedly years before. But now, her daughter Rowan has gone missing, and Edward is the only person she trusts to help locate her. She asks him to come to her home on a private island—Summersisle—a place with its own traditions where people observe a forgotten way of life. Edward seizes the opportunity to make his life right again, and soon finds himself on a seaplane bound for the islands of the Pacific Northwest.
But nothing is what it seems on isolated Summersisle, where a culture, dominated by its matriarch Sister Summersisle (Ellen Burstyn), is bound together by arcane traditions and a pagan festival known as "the Day of Death and Rebirth." The secretive people of Summersisle only ridicule his investigation, insisting that a child named Rowan never existed there...or if she ever did was no longer alive.
But what Edward doesn't know is that Willow's plea for help has invited more into his life than a chance for redemption. In unraveling Summersisle's closely held secrets, Edward is drawn into a web of ancient traditions and murderous deceit, and each step he takes closer to the lost child brings him one step closer to the unspeakable. And one step closer to The Wicker Man.
Academy Award winner Nicolas Cage stars in THE WICKER MAN, a dramatic thriller of mystery and obsession written and directed by Neil LaBute, the acclaimed filmmaker behind IN THE COMPANY OF MEN, NURSE BETTY and YOUR FRIENDS AND NEIGHBORS, based on the cult 1973 shocker of the same name, written by Anthony Shaffer. The film also stars Academy Award winner Ellen Burstyn (ALICE DOESN'T LIVE HERE ANYMORE), six-time nominee for films including (REQUIEM FOR A DREAM), Kate Beahan (FLIGHTPLAN), Frances Conroy (SIX FEET UNDER), Molly Parker (DEADWOOD), Leelee Sobieski (THE GLASS HOUSE) and Diane Delano (THE LADYKILLERS).
Based on THE WICKER MAN (1973) directed by Robin Hardy, screenplay by Anthony Shaffer and based on the novel "Ritual" by David Pinner.