There is a moment in Eleanor Wilson's new film Wicker when a woman who has been laughed at her entire life stands in a village square and declares that she is done waiting for love to happen to her. Instead, she's going to have it built. From reeds. By hand. On purpose.
If that sounds like the setup for a twee fairy tale, think again. Wicker, which arrives in theaters October 21 from Hollywood and has already been described by its own director as "unpitchable," is shaping up to be the year's strangest and most unexpectedly moving romance - a movie that pairs genuine tenderness with a premise so bizarre it probably shouldn't work. And yet here we are.
A Love Story Made of Reeds and Rage
The film follows a Fisherwoman (Olivia Colman) living on the outskirts of a seaside village, where she is, by the film's own account, smelly, single, and perpetually ridiculed. Fed up with her stuffy, small-minded neighbors, she commissions herself a husband woven from wicker - a decision that detonates the town's conservative sensibilities and sets off a chain reaction of outrage, jealousy, and all-out chaos.
That husband is played by Alexander Skarsgård, which is either the most inspired casting of the year or the most deranged, and possibly both. The film is being billed as a blend of romance, fantasy, and comedy, and it runs a tight 105 minutes - apparently enough time to fall in love with a man made of branches and then watch an entire village lose its collective mind about it.
Wilson, who directs, has been candid about the fact that Wicker was a hard sell at every stage. A story about a lonely woman who literally assembles her own partner doesn't fit neatly into any box the industry likes to use. It's too weird for a straight romance, too sincere for a comedy, too warm for a fantasy. That it got made at all is something of a minor miracle - and that it apparently lands is the real surprise.
A Cast That Reads Like a Dare
Look at this ensemble and try to tell me you're not at least curious. Colman, who can do devastating and deadpan in the same breath, anchors the whole thing. Skarsgård, freed from the constraints of, you know, having a human face to emote with, gets to play the Wicker Husband - a role that sounds like a physical and emotional high-wire act.
Around them, the village is populated by a murderers' row of character talent: Peter Dinklage as a Basket Weaver, Elizabeth Debicki as the Tailor's Wife, Marli Siu as the Basket Weaver's Sister, Nabhaan Rizwan as the Tailor, Richard E. Grant as the Doctor, and Kiell Smith-Bynoe rounding out the cast. That's a lineup that suggests the town itself is a character - petty, nosy, and hilariously judgmental - and that the film is as interested in the community's reaction as it is in the central romance.
It's the kind of cast that makes you think the script was genuinely special, because these are not actors who need to say yes to gimmicks. Grant alone could be reading a grocery list and make it compelling, and Debicki opposite him in a small-minded seaside village is a pairing I didn't know I needed.
Why "Unpitchable" Might Be the Point
The word "unpitchable" has become a strange badge of honor in Hollywood. It usually means a project is too original, too specific, or too emotionally naked for a market that prefers recognizable IP. Wicker seems to wear the label proudly. The premise is absurd on paper - a woman orders a husband like a piece of furniture - but the film's actual subject is loneliness, and the radical act of refusing to accept the life you've been handed.
That's what makes the horny, tender combination work. The film isn't winking at its own weirdness; it's taking the desire at the center of it seriously. A woman who commissions a partner isn't a punchline. She's someone who decided she deserved better, even if "better" has to be woven together by a Basket Weaver with a complicated family life.
Whether audiences will follow a movie this strange into theaters is the open question. Wicker opens October 21 with no early rating to speak of, which means the reception is genuinely up for grabs. But if the film delivers on even half of what its premise promises - genuine heat, genuine heartbreak, and a village full of people who can't handle a woman who knows what she wants - it might just become the sleeper romance of the fall.
Or it might be the most gloriously unhinged thing you see all year. Honestly? Both sound like a good time.
Source: The Hollywood Reporter
