The Ballad of Tam Lin or THE DEVIL'S WIDOW

With an alternative title like The Devil’s Widow, you would expect 1970’s The Ballad of Tam Lin to be a horror film. Certainly, the poster and the tagline, “She drained them of their manhood… and then their lives!” invoke the idea of a supernatural threat, and I personally went into the film thinking the threat would be devil-worshipping hippies or a neo-pagan nightmare, since this film was made right before the explosion of British folk horror. Those familiar with the story of Tam Lin, which the film gets its title and plot from, also know that the central threat of that story is Tam Lin being sacrificed as a tithe to hell by the faeries, but this adaptation strips all the magic from the story and makes it a contemporary drama. Don’t worry, there will be some evil hippies by the end though.

The high concept of this adaptation is that the faerie court from the original ballad has been transformed into a commune of counter-culture lay-abouts. The faerie queen is now Mickey Cazarat, played by Ava Gardner, an older rich woman who uses her wealth to support her gaggle of youths in order to make her feel alive and young. The youths mostly spend their time tossing frisbees while dreamy saxophone music plays, participating in Victorian parlor games like they’re in an Edith Wharton novel, and being cliches. The dizziest of the hippies is offered a pill and remarks, “I’ll put anything in my mouth as long as it’s illegal.” Mickey’s favorite in this group is her lover, the handsome photographer Tom Lynn (it’s Tam Lin, get it!), played by a young Ian McShane. From early on, it’s clear that Mickey is insecure about her age and Tom is squirming under Mickey’s controlling nature. Into this mix walks our Janet (Stephanie Beacham). The contrast between her and Mickey is immediate, as Mickey walks around in a rainbow caftan that would make a pride parade weep, and Janet is in her liberty print blouse and brown A-line skirt. She’s even the daughter of the vicar, because of course she is.

If you wanted to establish the plot inciting romance, you would be sure to put a lot of weight onto the scene the lover’s first meeting, right? Here, when Tom and Janet meet in the highlands, the scene stops being moving pictures and becomes still frames cross-fading into each other, with heightened emotional music. This choice is so weird and does so much to undercut the chemistry between these two characters, I can’t help but suspect the original scene was damaged somehow and they cobbled this together in haste as a substitute.

The story proceeds according to the fairy tale: Janet gets knocked up and sees a wise woman about an abortion, but decides against it. Tom finally breaks it off with Mickey to be with Janet, and Mickey goes from zero to murderous real fast. She kicks out all the dreamy hippies from her house and replaces them with EVIL HIPPIES, who follow her whims like kidnapping Tom and bringing him back to Caterwaugh. And yes, the evil hippies wear black with little neckerchiefs like a goth Austin Powers. At Caterwaugh, Mickey drugs Tom and sends him out into the woods where the evil hippies give chase, the plan being that he’ll kill himself in his drugged-out panic.

You can tell they’re evil because they wear all black besides their turtle necks and cravats.

This is where the film almost becomes the horror movie it was sold as. The aesthetics change, now there’s fog everywhere, and dramatic red lighting as if we’re suddenly in an Italian horror film of the era. During his bad trip, Tom imagines himself turning into first a bear, then a giant snake, and then fire, just as the original ballad has it. What this results in though, is Ian McShane rolling around in the mud with a ridiculous looking fake snake. After Janet cradles Tom through his bad trip, preventing him from dying, Mickey is shocked to see her very vague murder plan didn’t pan out and then just gives up. We end with Mickey leaving the country, a new boy toy at her side, suggesting this will all repeat itself.

I would like to state that I think this core concept is a strong one. What makes the original story so strong is the central conflict between its players. Janet must rescue her lover from a dangerous and controlling force in his life from before they met, an evil not to vanquish but to free him from before they can start their lives (and family) together.

The conflict of the original ballad of a woman who must free her lover of a dangerous controlling relationship is sturdy material to make a drama out of, even free of the fantastical trappings. If I were to point my finger at why this ballad adaptation doesn’t sing for me, I would say the film doesn’t use its languid pace in the beginning to deepen its characters. In a fairytale, the characters can be very broad because of how big and epic the story is, but when you turn The Faerie Queen into a human being, now there’s an expectation. I wanted more of these character’s histories and inner lives. Ava Gardner in this is just another version of The Evil Queen, aging and vain, jealous of a younger woman who’s fairer than she. I can recommend better bonkers horror movies, and better dramas - but this movie exists as an interesting curio and seemingly the only big screen adaptation of one of my favorite fairytales.

You can currently watch the whole thing on the great film preservation site, YouTube.