Movie Number 44 of 2026
The Movie: Wicker
The Cinema: Hoyts Victoria Gardens
Runtime: One hour 45 minutes
Stars: 4.5
Opens Thursday
Who knew that a fairytale could have so many good feminist messages about going against the grain, being kind and accepting people for who and what they are?
Wicker provides this in spades.
It’s wonderfully bonkers, but with Olivia Colman and Alexander Skarsgard in the lead roles, it was bound to be a bit left of centre.
I loved this. It was predestined. Written in the stars and a part of the moon cycle. It's the perfect film to go to with your friends, sit back and enjoy.
It tells the tale of the local fisherwoman (Olivia Colman), ostracised by the village locals for not conforming to the social norms of the day. Unmarried, she lives alone outside of the village. The rest of the women in the town are kept under then thumbs of their rather tedious husbands. Women are married by having a metal collar placed around their necks. Joy.
After a wedding tradition goes wrong, where she does the equivalent of catching the bouquet at the wedding, she asks the local basket weaver (Peter Dinklage) to make her a husband. This he does.
A month later the fisherwoman turns up at the church and her husband is present in the wicker form of Alexander Skarsgard. Oh my. The basket weaver did a bloody good job.
The other thing about the wicker husband is that he lacks the social norms that have made the men so, to be frank, awful. The wicker husband is kind, attentive, helpful. He pays lots of attention to his bride, who doesn't always know what to do with all of this.
The women of the village, particularly the tailor's wife (Elizabeth Debicki) aren't happy with this. They get jealous and start rumours about the wicker husband. The men of the village can't see what they're doing wrong - like they've always had control of their wives.
In the end, all of the rumours and back biting come to a head, with consequences for the whole town .
I will say no more.
Anything with Olivia Colman in it is going to be wonderful. She's brilliant in this. Alexander Skarsgard, under some amazing makeup and costumes, is perfect as her wicker groom. And the rest of the town is a hoot. Nobody has a name. The dishwasher, the drunk, the tailor and their wives. It's very cool.
Eleanor Wilson and Alex Huston Fischer have done a wonderful job of writing and directing this joyous fable about finding your person, no matter what the greater society says about your choices. As gorgeous as this film is, the feminist message is strong, but not that is slaps you about the face.
See it. It's wonderful.
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