Once upon a time, in a movie, a fisherwoman in a provincial village was lonely. It wasn’t necessarily the case that she wanted a romantic partner. The customs of the village were such that coupling up was fairly unappealing, at least for the woman in the twosome. Still, she was enough of an outcast, meanly mocked by her neighbors for the occupational hazard of smelling of seafood, that she led a sadly solitary existence. This fisherwoman was played by Olivia Colman, so every one of those emotions carried an added resonance, a deeply felt sense of realness even when parts of the tale ventured into the fantastical.

How fantastical could it get? Well, having reached a breaking point, the fisherwoman enlists the service of a local basket weaver, played by Peter Dinklage. Having noted that his skill approaches the level of wizardry, the fisherwoman asks this basket weaver to make her a husband. Rather than some mere totem or inanimate stand-in, the basket weaver musters all his artisan potency to bend willow twigs into a tall, handsome gent who can be accurately described as a fetching cross between Alexander Skarsgård and a picnic basket. Under a layer of astounding makeup effects, Skarsgård plays this wicker spouse with a halting tenderness.

Alex Huston Fischer and Eleanor Wilson are the co-directors and co-writers (adapting a short story by Ursula Wills) of the film in question, Wicker. As with any sturdy fable, the film ventures into outlandish territory to make points that can readily be applied to the hard reality of now. Unfortunately, the ideas in the movie need more focus. Sometimes the film takes a clearly feminist angle and sometimes the moral of the story is of a more general society-should-be-nicer-to-offbeat-people flavor. Individual points and scenes are effective, but the different themes don’t, well, weave together in a wholly satisfying way. Wicker is a fine bit of craft, but it doesn’t carry quite as much as it could or should.