British film-maker Justin Hardy, the son of The Wicker Man 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’s archives.
In a statement, the director’s family said they are “devastated 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’t be with us at his premiere. He was a man of family, of boundless creativity and of devotion for everyone he held dear.” The BBC reported Hardy died after a heart attack.
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’s The Relief of Belsen, a feature-length television drama about the liberation of the concentration camp, starring Corin and Gemma Redgrave.
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’s making of the 1973 film, the uncredited part their mother played in its production, and the toll it took on their family.
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, and when it was rereleased for its 50th anniversary in 2023, the paper’s film critic Peter Bradshaw wrote that “it is so much better and more distinctive than any film that comes under the folk-horror heading … it’s virtually a one-movie genre in itself”.
Robin Hardy wrote and directed a sequel, The Wicker Tree, 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’s archives in the attic of their former family home.
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.
On Monday, Dominic Hardy paid further tribute to his brother, saying: “He aimed to use film on his own terms, to tell stories from original sources.” And describing Wrath of the Gods, he said: “I feel it is personal, a distinctively new creative statement from so seasoned a film-maker … When I last saw him, on 17 July, he was looking forward to a future in which writing scripts could be his exclusive focus, bringing him, along with the form’s inbuilt challenges, generous measures of joy.”
Wrath of the Gods has its world premiere at the horror film festival FrightFest in London on 28 August.
