Anyone who has been to the horror of a farmer’s market will be familiar with what’s sold there – premium priced vegetables covered in goodness knows what, the fudge maker selling six cubes in a plastic bag from £10 and then there’s the Wicker man – not the seminal folk horror film of the 1970’s but the craftsman dedicated to making anything out of wicker including his jumper which prevented him from giving you any change as he can’t bend his elbows to get his hands in his (wicker) trouser pockets.
Wicker is the answer…
But it’s that material that sees Peter Dinklage’s Basket Maker in an unspecified past century selling his wares at the village market where Olivia Colman’s Fisherwoman (everyone is known by their trade except for the married women who are known as the innkeepers wife, the Baker’s wife etc) sells her fish and is derided by the other villagers for her odour and her determined single-dom sneering at weddings where the wives to be wear a locking metal collar rather than a ring. But after a village version of catching the brides flower posy sees her singled out to next be married which is derided by the village woman led by Queen Bee Tailor’s wife (Elizabeth Debicki), she visits the basket maker and asks him to make her a husband.
Instead of having her sectioned he instead takes it in his stride telling her to go the village chapel in a month where his handmade husband waits for her in the form of Alexander Skargard. It’s an astonishing creation by the effects team with the actor still recognizable and still able to emote through it all and is totally devoted and dedicated to her. It’s not long before they celebrate their wedding night in time honoured fashion and the sight of him creaking as he ruts away at her is akin to Hugh Hefner’s honeymoon culminating in the sexual equivalent of a vacuum cleaner being emptied.
Envy…
With the film split into chapter headings the film sees the village women grow increasingly envious of this new man so totally devoted to his wife compared to their own husbands who in turn concerned that he is making them look, at best, inadequate in every way. And Skarsgard is the perfect husband telling Colman, ‘You’re the reason that I live and breathe’ something we’ve not heard since our hospitalized uncle began talking to his life support machine.
Colman and Skarsgard are as likable and endearing as might be expected from a pair of actors who always have an immediate shine about them. And there’s good support from the surrounding cast and a cameo from Richard E Grant looking like Christopher Walken’s long lost 16th century brother.
Based on the ‘The Wicker Husband short story by Ursula Willis this is utterly charming. often funny with something to say about patriarchal dominated marriages and living outside of the norms of society and continues to cement Colman’s national treasure status.
related feature : Olivia Colman & Jessie Buckley introduce Wicked Little Letters
related feature : Home grown actors who make it big internationally…….
Here’s the trailer…..
