The Wicker Man (1973)

Classification Issues

• Threat and horror
  • Scenes of horror include undetailed sight of a man being burned alive.
• Sex
  • Sex consists of a dimly-lit sequence, which reveals from a distance couples engaged in sexual activity. The lighting and distance conceal any details, the scene being presented in the context of a fertility ritual.
• Nudity
  • A bare-breasted woman dancing provocatively alone in her room.  
• Additional issues
  • The film also contains some very mild bad language (‘hell’, ‘damn’) and mild sex references.

Cinema classification

On its original release, as the ‘B-feature’ in a double bill alongside Nicolas Roeg’s Don’t Look Now, both critics and audiences alike were unsure what to make of its mix of horror, comedy, sex, bawdy folk songs and an unremittingly bleak ending. However, it was largely unknown to both parties that the film had been the victim of a severe editing process, with the distributor – British Lion – cutting down the movie from 99 minutes to 87 minutes in order to satisfy the logistical exhibition pressures of screening two movies in a double bill format.

The BBFC received The Wicker Man for formal classification in the summer of 1973 and passed the film with an X certificate – broadly equivalent to today’s 18. The main classification issues that determined the decision were sex, nudity and horror. The BBFC had already requested that a scene featuring female back and buttock nudity be removed from a trailer for the film. However, apart from this, the film was deemed to be unproblematic at the adult category and was released uncut. Despite some reservations regarding the moral ambiguity of the film’s ending, the BBFC generally took a very light view of the work, with one Senior Examiner noting, “There can be few people who do not recognise this film as simple fantasy. Inhabitants, even of spoof islands, in the United Kingdom are not really given to burning constables and cattle.”

Audience reaction

Over the next twenty years The Wicker Man attracted a new audience and its cult status grew amongst genre fans – encompassing fan conventions, fanzines and websites dedicated to the film. Inevitably many myths also grew around the movie and many of its fans were confused by the various versions of the film that existed and whether the BBFC had a hand in cutting it or not.

The BBC had screened a different version to that of the UK theatrical release, running at approximately 96 minutes, and Christopher Lee (Lord Summerisle) and director Robin Hardy had gone on record claiming that they both remembered an even longer version. In addition, during the early 1980s, Hardy had managed to pieced together a version of the film from various prints he had tracked down. He claimed that this re-construction came close to that of his original edit, but he had only secured the rights to screen and release it in the US.     

Video classification

A version identical to the 1973 theatrical version was submitted to the BBFC for video classification for the first time in May 1990 by Warner Brothers Home Video. The Examiners who viewed the film argued that under current standards there was a case for passing the film 15, stating that the film’s fantasy elements and theatrical occult theme would be seen as slightly dated and possibly amusing to a younger audience.

However, the film’s dark ending with its prolonged scene of human sacrifice, persuaded them to rate it 18, with one Examiner claiming that “the 18 is quite simply because the feature ends with human sacrifice – the ritual burning of Howie offers us no escape from his predictable but awful end.”

It was also noted that several scenes of nudity, including an orgy in a graveyard setting, supported the 18.

However, the release of the 87 minute video version of the film only added further speculation as to the existence of a definitive print of The Wicker Man. 

Subsequent submissions

In 2001 the film’s new worldwide rights holder Canal+ pulled together various found prints of the film and combined them to create the longest and closest version to Hardy’s original 99 minute cut. This version was submitted on DVD to the BBFC in December of 2001 for reclassification as ‘The Director’s Cut’. 

The Examiners who viewed the new version acknowledged that there had been significant changes in public attitudes to the portrayal of sex over the previous decade and that the BBFC’s current Classification Guidelines, introduced the previous year, reflected these changes. 

With reference to the infamous orgy scene one Examiner noted: “The visuals are dim lit, only showing in MLS [medium long shot] a woman riding on a man who is caressing the former's bare breasts. Then the camera pans away, showing other copulating couples. No genital nudity is featured. Given the story which explores the issue of the Pagans' attitude towards sex, the treatment is considered restrained and well justified in context. This kind of treatment just sits comfortably in the territory of 15 under the current Guidelines.”

Both examiners agreed that the human sacrifice scene created quite a strong impact, but was also similarly restrained in its treatment: “The burning of the victim is almost painless. There is not any sustained or detailed infliction of pain. The scene has its impact on the psychological front rather than on the graphic details”.

Taking these points into consideration both examiners felt that under the new set of Guidelines 18 would be an unreasonable recommendation; therefore the film was classified at 15.

Subsequent submissions

The shorter version of The Wicker Man was resubmitted for a new video certificate in 2002 and reclassified 15 in line with the longer Director’s Cut. This was reflected when the film was submitted in 2007 for a new cinema rating ahead of a new theatrical re-release.

A third version of the film – known as ‘The Final Cut’ – was submitted for cinema classification in 2013 and classified 15.