After filmmaker Leigh Whannell delivered such a great reimagining of Universal’s The Invisible Man, I hoped his take on the Wolf Man would have the same, or even more significant, impact. However, after I came out of the press screening of his latest remake of a Universal monster property, I was utterly disappointed. Though Whannell and his co-writer Corbett Tuck attempted to ground the story in reality, with some true-to-life human problems, the film struggles to land any horrific or tragic impact. The entire affair shows some great and creative ideas, but the film never makes any of these elements work.
Christopher Abbott stars as Blake Lovell, a loving father and husband raised by a militaristic and strict father (Sam Jaeger) who taught his son to protect his family at all costs. This backstory is presented through a sequence that reveals a particularly harrowing hunting trip at Blake’s father’s property in the woods. The film flashes forward to the present, where Blake is a stay-at-home dad to his daughter, Ginger (Malinda Firth), while his wife and Ginger’s mother, Charlotte (Julia Garner), is a journalist.
When he receives word of his father’s demise, Blake and the family travel to the Lovell property in the woods, where a bizarre, ravenous beast attacks them. This beast turns out to be a werewolf. During the attack, the creature wounds Blake, who eventually undergoes a “shocking” transformation.
While a lot of the filmmakers’ ideas are solid, it is the execution of these concepts and themes that fail this film. The entire development of the characters is very weak and ham-fisted. Many of the themes that make Whannell’s The Invisible Man work do not work at all in this movie. If the filmmakers wished to make a statement about parental abuse and how that trauma impacts future generations, they completely mishandled their goal with this story.
The movie acts like a slow burn, incorporating body horror, gore, and tension. The problem is that the slow burn never catches on to deliver incendiary levels of thrills and excitement. Though the movie is not super long, it slogs too slowly, focusing on all the wrong elements. At one point, I grew somewhat bored with the proceedings, and couldn’t wait for some resolution.
The filmmakers have assembled a great cast, but their talents are definitely squandered here. The best actor in the movie is Abbott, but this film needed better development of the Charlotte character to drive home the family problems this story demands. I also wanted this film to be more than just a cabin-in-the-woods horror story, because it is so limiting considering the possibilities of werewolf stories.
In addition, though the makeup is adequate, I was not impressed with the werewolves’ creature design. I don’t know if budgetary constraints are to blame, but the fact that the werewolf design is bad was another disappointment with this movie. After Whannell did such a damn good job with his remake of The Invisible Man, it breaks my heart that he could not pull off the same horror, thrills, and excitement that he accomplished previously. If Universal does continue with this series of monster remakes, I hope they select someone else who has a bold and exciting new vision for these properties.