I also saw The Wicker Man, the original, not the shitty Nic Cage remake (go on and sue me for calling your remake a shitty film Nicky boy, sue me, I dare ya), and it held up pretty well.
It's still creepy and it's also a bit cheesy. The scenes where the couples are humping in the cemetery and where Britt Ekland dances nude in the room next to Edward Woodward are super cheesy. However a naked dancing Britt Ekland is always a welcome sight, no matter how cheesy her dancing and how bad the music.
The weakest part of The Wicker Man is Edward Woodward. I know he has to be priggish and prudish for the story to work but his performance in this movie is a one note one and it gets so tiring by the end of the film that you are rooting for him to burn up inside that big wicker man thingy.You know what film holds up really well after 30 years? The Deer Hunter.
The only thing false about this film are the deer hunting scenes. The rest of the movie is dead on and the actors are amazing. I watchted this again last night and I was astounded by the De Niro, Streep, Walken, Savage, and the rest of the folks in this film. 
I had forgotten parts of the movie, the last time I was it was 1978, but what I remembered as being good the first time I saw it was even better this time around. The wedding and wedding reception scenes were amazing. The interplay between Streep and De Niro in them is fantastic. I had forgotten how great John Savage was in his scenes in the Viet Cong holding pen, his quiet screams and swallowed fear are amazing to watch. And the tenderness of De Niro as he tries to comfort his buddy is just amazing as well.
If you have not seen this movie in a while or if you have never seen it, see it. It's worth every rave you ever heard about it.
17 comments:
Agreed. Nicholas Cage's only good film was "Raising Arizona", and the "Deer Hunter" is brilliant.
I'll bet you are right that the Deerhunter would hold up well. I remember it being a pretty incredible and powerful film.
You are brave. I am terrified to watch movies I thought I liked, because I know I will wind up questioning my judgment.
I am so in love w M. Streep...
Angry-Me too.
You're so right abou The Deer Hunter, it's great.
Come for the free snells, stay for the movie reviews!
Nic Cage gets a sour face from me overall.
Has it really been thirty years since "The Deer Hunter?" Wow.
The Deer Hunter is probably one of the best American movies ever made. It's really two movies in one but it works somehow. Anytime you get Deniro AND Walken chewing up the scenes you know it's gonna rock.
Deer Hunter lover here too. My office went bowling last week and I was on a team with a Christopher Walken look-alike. Now THAT's surreal.
Deer Hunter is in my top ten, for sure. I love the line: "This... is this." I use it all the time!
GKL-I almost used that line for the title post.
I love both of those too! And I refuse to watch the Cage remake of the Wicker Man. It just looks bad. And not "bad" in a good way.
This is one of those classics that I've never seen, along with Apocalyse Now and The Boys from Brazil, etc. I finally saw Ordinary People and Sophie's Choice (both excellent). Maybe I'll add some of these to my netflix queue. OH MAN--and I still have to do my fave-movies-by-year post like you did! Dangit! There just isn't enough time at work to get all my blogging done!
I just saw Deer Hunter for the first time and it was powerful. You are right about the deer hunting scenes being out of place. Since they were filmed here in the North Cascades there was a MAJOR ring of unreality for me. Here is this movie set in Pennsylvania and then they are driving down a road about 5 miles from the ranger station where I work on the other side of the country.
Man, did they drink a lot in that movie or what?
The only NC movie I ever really liked was Birdie. I really really liked The Deer Hunter. It is one of those movies that profoundly affects you when have seen it. I loved the whole thing-soundtrack and all. At the time I saw it I was really getting into classical guitar and I tried so hard to play the main theme!
Wicker Man (the original) was c-r-ee-p-y, yes indeed. I read a short story a few years ago, in a collection of horror stories about academia. The one that really got to me was very much in the spirit of Wicker Man, where an academic studying pagan customs ends up becoming the human sacrifice. It still makes me shudder to think of it.
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