BLACK BEAR

Imagine my shock when Wicker (🌟🌟🌟🌟) was not merely the raunchy fairytale romp that the trailers and marketing campaign suggested, but actually one of the most surprisingly heartfelt films of the year. Now, there’s plenty of bed-breaking debaucherous fun to be had as well, but what’s underneath that is a really meaningful story about what it means to love and be loved by someone else. The lead performances by Olivia Colman and Alexander Skargard are picture-perfect, both ripped from the pages of a fable, and the entire supporting cast rises to the occasion as well. Pair that with a tight script and some creative camera work, and you get a homerun of a film. At just under two hours, this was a perfect escape for my Sunday afternoon.  
The story here follows the inhabitants of a small folksy village, where everyone remains unnamed: every man labeled only by their profession, every woman labeled by the profession of their husband or father. The exception being the Fisher Woman (Colman) who supplies the town with freshly caught fish, but often finds herself the butt of the townspeople’s jokes. Tired of living a solitary life but also disillusioned with the town’s archaic marriage traditions, she jokingly asks the local Wicker (Peter Dinklage) to make her a husband. When the ideal Wickerman husband (Skarsgard) arrives at the church for their wedding day, the two begin a true storybook romance. Having landed herself the picture perfect husband, the unconventional couple quickly draws the attention and ire of the entire town.  
I cannot put into words just how effectively Colman and Skarsgard sell this entire concept and story with the power of their performances. Colman is almost childlike as the defiant Fisher Woman, holding nothing back when she spits in the faces of the town’s traditions, and barely containing her giggles (and more) when she weds the Wickerman. Skarsgard is a mix between Lurch and The Iron Giant, a lumbering, simple-minded presence, existing to meet his wife’s every need (every. need.) and love her in a way that was unheard for the world the movie depicts. Dinklage is charming as the Wicker and narrator who soliloquies about his creations and the nature of love, and Elizabeth Debicki plays an absolutely detestable villain as the Tailor’s Wife (née Doctor’s Daughter) who rallies the town against this Wicker romance.  
What’s truly great about this story is how the marriage of the Fisher Woman and Wicker Man makes the entire town reevaluate their own relationships with their significant others. Though the film is obviously in a fairytale-esque village, the picture it paints of marriage via business association and loveless interactions is far from fiction. The rest of the characters have no identity outside their socially prescribed relationships and are awoken from their loveless stupor by the genuine love the Wickerman has for his wife, and that she has for him in return. Likewise, the Fisher Woman learns for the first time what love is actually like; to let part of your heart exist outside of your body and hope it stays safe and true. Because whilst love can give you something extraordinary, it also gives you something to lose.  
It’s such a genuinely beautiful story about what we gain from love and what we lose in its absence, as well as the cost of love and vulnerability as opposed to the comfort yet isolation of solitude. What a shock to find a story this tender wrapped in wicker.