The death has been announced of the British director Robin Hardy, best known for his 1973 cult classic The Wicker Man.
The filmmaker and author, who was 86, died on July 1 and had been hospitalised in recent weeks.
Hardy began his directing career in Canada and the US in the 1960s making TV dramas, ads and educational films. He made his feature debut with The Wicker Man, which starred Edward Woodward and Christopher Lee.
The Wicker Man told the story of a Police Sergeant (Woodward) investigating the disappearance of a girl on the Scottish island of Summerisle. Lee played Lord Summerisle with the film's mix of mirth, mystery and malevolence making it one of the most iconic chillers in the history of British cinema.
Heavily cut for its cinema release, The Wicker Man was shown on a double bill with another classic, Nicolas Roeg's Don't Look Now. The story of the multiple versions of The Wicker Man, and the mythology surrounding the film, resulted in a number of documentaries, including 2001's Burnt Offering: The Cult of the Wicker Man. The Wicker Man was remade in 2006 by American director Neil LaBute with Nicolas Cage as its leading man. It performed disastrously at the box office.
There was a gap of 13 years between Hardy's The Wicker Man and next film, the thriller The Fantasist, which was filmed in Dublin and Wicklow but was a commercial flop. Its cast included such Irish acting greats as tJohn Kavanagh and the late Mick Lally.
A quarter of a century elapsed before Hardy's 2011 film The Wicker Tree, which was described as a companion piece to The Wicker Man. Following the death of Christopher Lee last year, Hardy had said he wanted to make a third Wicker Man film.
In a career spanning over 200 features, Lee had paid Hardy the ultimate compliment by saying that The Wicker Man was the best.
