Climbing Higher Pictures

Pained by the Twilight series? Itching for some classic werewolf storytelling? Eager to see if the remake of the Universal monster is up to snuff? I don’t blame you, and with the caliber of actors and crew involved, this one seemed like the closest shot to a “sure thing” that this particular company has had for a long time. However, it was supposed to come out in November, and it’s had its share of headaches behind the scenes. Is this the sort of film that can rise above, or is it left howling at the moon? Find out below:

The Wolfman Review

By Ryan Hamelin

Movie Grade: C+

This is a sad day for me. The time has come to review a movie that is both everything I normally enjoy from a Hollywood release, and the worst case of studio excess I’ve witnessed in the last decade. After multiple directors, wholesale re-edits, vast amounts of additional shooting, and a special effects overhaul that re-did all of Rick Baker’s probably brilliant transformation makeup effects and replaced them with decent but not terrific CG ones, The Wolfman is finally getting released on the world, a full 3 months after it was originally slated to. And yet, even with so much to hate and so much to love, I can’t bring myself to find a solid foundation on which to analyze and review it. The extent to which I nothing this movie is so overwhelming that I’m surprised I was able to come up with a letter grade at all, much less back it up with substantiated argumentation.

Part of it is a production problem. The movie looks great, and the classic nature of its art direction, lighting, and color palette really works. The costumes are uniformly terrific, and the world comes through loud and clear, as though the one thing anybody really spent time focusing on was the canvas on which to tell the narrative, instead of the narrative itself. The acting is all over the place, with about half the scenes hitting all the right notes, and the rest, probably shot over a year apart, feeling like everyone involved was simply going through the motions. Even Anthony Hopkins feels uneven here, and that is both a feat of editing and direction to reduce a master craftsman to a bumbling idiot. Hugo Weaving, however, still comes off well in all his scenes, and is one of the only reasons you’ll have to keep watching.

The bigger problem is one of story. Did anyone, at any point in the process, ask themselves if this was a story worth telling? Most of the audience disappointment is going to stem from spending 2 hours in a movie theater watching a tale unfold for which they have absolutely no emotional investment or involvement. Why does that character exist? Why would anyone do that to their own son? How can they write an ending for this which doesn’t result in an outcome that is either patently ridiculous or wholly unsatisfying? To their credit, the vast majority of the story feels like it’s working, right up until you hit the next scene and it all begins to unravel again. Nothing can save a film without a reason to exist, and no feats of special effects, boo scares, blood, or action can fill the void. A different plot, way back in pre-production, if mixed with all the talent on this crew, could have yielded the greatest werewolf movie ever made. That’s probably what disheartens me the most.

Just in case you were in danger of possibly enjoying this particular story, you have a crack editing team to confuse and slice the hell out of it for you. Sure they can generate decent scares when they wind the movie this tight, but at what cost? Breezing through the first half hour like you’re watching a scrapbook instead of a movie wasn’t what the original director had in mind, and I doubt very much that the film is well served by a lack of space to breathe. Dramatic tension doesn’t just suddenly appear, and if you’re not confident enough in your film to allow it to develop, you might as well just shelve the whole thing instead of try and force feed it down the audience’s throats.

Beneath all the artifice and painful production headaches, there still is a light-hearted and entertaining creature feature buried in here somewhere. People I saw it with found it scary and fun, I just don’t think that much of that was a result of the filmmaking in question. Yes you’ll jump a few times, yes it gets violent and bloody enough to earn its R-rating, and yes you get plenty of dramatic transformations to go around. But is it worth the price of a ticket? Now that is the harder question to answer, and something I certainly can’t answer for you. Would I pay to see it again? Unlikely. Is it worth the first viewing? That has more to do with the kind of person you are, and what you value from a movie ticket and a tub of popcorn. I leave the final analysis entirely in your hands.