Wolf Man
Wolf Man
Starring Christopher Abbott, Julia Garner, Matilda Firth, Sam Jaeger
Directed by Leigh Whannell
Thirty years after an adventure with his father at their remote home in the woods, Blake Lovell (Christopher Abbott) has a beautiful young daughter named Ginger (Matilda Firth) and a wife Charlotte (Julia Garner) whom he's distant with due to her workaholic nature and his violent streak. When he hears that his father (Sam Jaeger) has disappeared and is presumed dead, he takes his family to his childhood home in hopes of bringing everyone together again. On the road, however, he finds a creature that causes him to go off the road, and then is scratched by the creature as they escape to the house. Once there, they find themselves trapped by the creature outside, but things are worse for Charlotte and Ginger as Blake starts transforming into a creature himself, and as he slowly loses his humanity they find themselves in danger from the man they love.
"Wolf Man" is one of those films that has a lot of promise, yet fails to deliver on every aspect. It's not a terrible film, but not a great one either, and unlike "The Invisible Man," it won't be talked about weeks after it leaves theaters. It's dry, slow, monotonous, not very exciting or terrifying, and shot in such a way it's very hard to see what's going on. The story itself showed the most promise, but again dropped the ball by making it so generic and fleeting it felt almost like an obligation rather than a passion project by the end of it all.
My friend said this, and I agree, that "Wolf Man" felt like an A24 movie - or at least made an attempt to feel like it. Instead of cheap jump scares, there was some deeply dramatic moments, or at least there should've been, but again the script felt like it disappeared halfway through and everyone was just there shrugging their shoulders and guessing what to do next. It's supposed to be a deeply emotional movie about a father turning into a monster in front of his young daughter whom he swore he'd never hurt, but the only reason I know that is he kept saying it over and over, like, again, he had no script to go off of. Many lines were recycled throughout, told with as much intensity as making an order at McDonald's.
The film was shot in almost total darkness, where I had to squint my eyes to see anything exciting happening, which wasn't too often. My mind wandered numerous times and when I snapped back to the screen, nothing exciting happened in the interim. The editing was choppy as well, as Blake's fight with the other werewolf was supposed to be intense, but much like everything else, fell flat.
The performances as well felt hollow and empty. Christopher Abbott is a protective father because he doesn't want to be like his own father, and will do anything to protect his family, even as he changes into a creature bent on destruction. That's all we know about him, and Abbott plays it as such. Matilda Firth is annoying as the young Ginger, who only knows how to talk at an elevated tone and say "daddy" over and over and over again. Julia Garner's talent was wasted as Charlotte, as she didn't even seem to know the character she was playing, but instead zombie-walked through her performance with a flat, monotone delivery.
What the movie did do right was the creature design, which was all practical, which was something I really appreciated. Much like the Oscar-winning work in "An American Werewolf in London," "Wolf Man" transforms Abbott's Blake into the titular wolf man slowly, as teeth, nails and hair fall out, then the total transformation begins, and it's very impressive (from what I could see).
What else the film did right was probably something it didn't intend, and that was create a new movie in my mind. During his transformation, we would switch perspective from Charlotte and Ginger to Blake, with us seeing his night vision like we were in his shoes and, more interestingly, hear how he would hear. When Charlotte and Ginger are trying to talk sense into him, all we hear is gibberish, and we're with him when he says he can't understand what they're saying. Lately films have taken us through the villains' eyes, such as "In a Violent Nature" and "Presence," and I was thinking how cool it would be to have a movie through the werewolf's eyes. Sadly, this wasn't that movie, and instead it's just one that'll fade into obscurity - but at least it wasn't as bad as a universe-ending film.
The Score: C
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