{"id":573626,"date":"2026-08-03T16:51:09","date_gmt":"2026-08-03T16:51:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/573626\/"},"modified":"2026-08-03T16:51:09","modified_gmt":"2026-08-03T16:51:09","slug":"justin-hardy-director-of-wicker-man-sequel-dies-three-weeks-before-its-premiere-movies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/573626\/","title":{"rendered":"Justin Hardy, director of Wicker Man sequel, dies three weeks before its premiere | Movies"},"content":{"rendered":"

British film-maker Justin Hardy, the son of The Wicker Man<\/a> director Robin Hardy, has died aged 61. He had recently completed Wrath of the Gods, a second sequel to the fondly regarded folk-horror film, inspired by a story idea discovered in his father\u2019s archives.<\/p>\n

In a statement, the director\u2019s family said they are \u201cdevastated to share that Justin Hardy passed away [on Friday]. He was so full of life right to the end, and incredibly energised to be working towards premiering his latest film this month. We are all so proud of him and heartbroken he won\u2019t be with us at his premiere. He was a man of family, of boundless creativity and of devotion for everyone he held dear.\u201d The BBC reported<\/a> Hardy died after a heart attack.<\/p>\n

Dominic Hardy, left, and Justin Hardy, co-writers of Wrath of the Gods, at a Wicker Man anniversary screening in 2023. Photograph: Vianney Le Caer\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n

Hardy had a varied career and his 45 directing credits include dramas, documentaries and romcoms for the cinema and television. He was nominated for a Bafta for 2007\u2019s The Relief of Belsen, a feature-length television drama about the liberation of the concentration camp, starring Corin and Gemma Redgrave.<\/p>\n

In 2024 he made Children of the Wicker Man, a documentary based on a book of the same name which he co-wrote with his brother Dominic, about their father\u2019s making of the 1973 film, the uncredited part their mother played in its production, and the toll it took on their family.<\/p>\n

The Wicker Man stars Edward Woodward as a devout Christian police officer who investigates a disappearance on a fictional Scottish island lorded over by a pagan priest played by Christopher Lee. In 2010, the Guardian ranked it the No 4 best horror film of all time<\/a>, and when it was rereleased for its 50th anniversary in 2023, the paper\u2019s film critic Peter Bradshaw wrote<\/a> that \u201cit is so much better and more distinctive than any film that comes under the folk-horror heading \u2026 it\u2019s virtually a one-movie genre in itself\u201d.<\/p>\n

Robin Hardy wrote and directed a sequel, The Wicker Tree<\/a>, released in 2011. Wrath of the Gods, which completes the trilogy, was written by Justin and Dominic Hardy after the story concept was found among their father\u2019s archives<\/a> in the attic of their former family home.<\/p>\n

Filmed in Shetland, it stars Norwegian actor Christiane Schaldemose as a woman who returns to a North Sea island to bury her husband after his suicide. When children start going missing, she is cast out by the eccentric locals for being a symbol of bad luck and evil.<\/p>\n

Wrath of the Gods has its world premiere<\/a> at the horror film festival FrightFest in London on 28 August.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"British film-maker Justin Hardy, the son of The Wicker Man director Robin Hardy, has died aged 61. He…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":573627,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[146,85,46,397],"class_list":["post-573626","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-movies","tag-entertainment","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-movies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573626","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=573626"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573626\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/573627"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=573626"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=573626"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=573626"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}