A kind of New England blending of The Wicker Man, Children of the Corn and The Stepford Wives. This was difficult to acquire and reviews suggest that versions exist ranging from a 2 hour edited VHS to a full 5 hour initial broadcast (Wikipedia notes the full original broadcast was 3hr48 - is there really a 5 hour version!?) The grainy file I acquired was about 3 hours long and really a wretched way to enjoy a film, but needs must. It had some very obvious and egregious cuts, which may have contributed to some of the rushed and incoherent narrative. All that considered, this was a very slow-moving creepy American folk horror, clearly padded out to fulfil the required running time; it's difficult to imagine a 5 hour version. The "dark secret" was unfortunately pretty obvious to me, being familiar with the details of the early pagan matriarchy, and hence as soon as I heard Worthy bemoaning the 7-year requirement of being a Harvest Lord I anticipated that this term ends fatally. Being aware of this and predicting the ending doesn't necessarily diminish the film too much; there's a lot of atmosphere and mystery to enjoy and a few diversions along the way (not all necessary: a strange sub-plot about a villager who may have committed suicide having been afflicted with gigantism seems totally arbitrary). Bette Davis is wonderfully steely in her role and Rosanna Arquette is great too as the blossoming daughter being insidiously drawn into village customs, going from a reclusive adolescent to a sinister woman in full bloom. Although there are many tropes and characters derivative of the genre, this film makes a good argument for itself and I hope one day to watch it again in its longer form.
