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Big guys on fire
Published: 10/19/2012 12:21 PM
Last Modified: 10/19/2012 1:00 PM


Big Tex on fire.


The Wicker Man, fulfilling its devilish destiny...

Regardless of one's feelings about the statue of "Big Tex" on the Dallas fairgrounds and all the things it can represent, the images of this Texas State Fair emblem going up in flames are pretty creepy.

Especially that one in which the arms are still recognizable but the face is this corona of fire. It’s almost enough to give one nightmares – imagine that recorded greeting of “Howdy. Folks!” coming out of that face….

Since it’s so close to Halloween, when our thoughts tend to turn toward the things we find unnerving, the vision of Big Tex on fire brought to mind the finale of one of the creepier movies I’ve seen – “The Wicker Man.”

Not the recent “remake,” which starred Nicolas Cage in what was really a waste of time and celluloid. I’m talking about the 1973 original, directed by Robin Hardy, written by Anthony Shaffer and starring Edward Woodward, Britt Ekland and Christopher Lee.

For the uninitiated: Woodward plays a Scottish police officer who is comes to a place called Summerisle to look for a young girl who has been missing for some time. The very devout Woodward is appalled at what he finds – a happily pagan community that claims to have no knowledge whatsoever about the missing girl.

Yet Woodward’s character keeps finding clues that make him more and more determined to find the girl and rescue her from this place – which is beginning to have an effect on his own character.

It's not a film for everyone -- those who think horror comes via gouts of gore and gotcha! shocks every 45 seconds will likely find "The Wicker Man" uninvolving.

But then, “The Wicker Man” isn’t a conventional horror story as it is a terror story – one that creates a sense of ever-increasing dread, as its proceeds inexorably toward its unnerving climax.

It’s the sort of film that might convince you from explore one of those off-the-beaten-path little towns – especially if they take to building very large effigies out of highly flammable materials.



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ARTS

James D. Watts Jr. has lived in Oklahoma for most his life, even though he still has people saying to him, "Don't sound like you're from around these parts." A University of Oklahoma Phi Beta Kappa graduate, Watts has received the Governor Arts Award, Harwelden Award and the National Conference of Christians and Jews Beth Macklin Award for his writing. Before coming to the Tulsa World, Watts worked for the Tulsa Tribune.

Contact him at (918) 581-8478.

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