We’ve tried cremes, powders and ointments, but we can’t get wolf men out of our hair.
Everyone from Jack Nicholson to Benicio del Toro have taken a crack at the classic monster, so an update was inevitable. It’s what Hollywood does.
Reboot, Rinse, Repeat.
“Wolf Man” understands that on an elemental level. It’s time for something different, to shake the character like an Etch-A-Sketch and deliver a fresh take on the classic monster.
“Wolf Man” succeeds before it fails.
The Blumhouse original isn’t eager to clone past efforts, but its attempt to reframe the saga comes up short when its imagination runs dry.
Powder-keg dry.
Christopher Abbott stars as Blake, a dedicated father caring for his young daughter at all costs. It’s what his pappy taught him, and his passion for the task has left him conflicted.
It’s one of many intriguing angles introduced and later ignored. Even the film’s opening text crawl does the heavy lifting when the subsequent events should matter more.
Blake decides to take his wife and daughter back to his old home in the woods. He hopes the family can reboot in a rural environment, and he can rededicate himself to his wife, Charlotte (Julia Garner).
Their rental truck crashes along the way, depositing them near the family home but stranded in the wild. It’s where they first catch a glimpse of a man-like beast stalking the grounds.
Now, it’s survival time.
“Wolf Man’s” prologue is perfectly creepy. We see a young Blake tutored in hunting 101 by his dad, but the sequence builds to a terrifying encounter on a duck blind.
Director/co-writer Leigh Wannell (“Saw”) knows horror better than most of his peers, and he proves it during the opening scenes. He can’t maintain that intensity.
His superior “Invisible Man” reboot had better thrills, richer characters and more intriguing developments. “Wolf Man” shrinks as the story hurtles toward its busy conclusion.
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“Wolf Man” feels like an indie film you might stumble onto via streaming. The film’s focus stays mostly on the rural home in the woods, and the time span is mere hours in length. That’s a claustrophobic framing that could work to the film’s advantage had the story offered depth, nasty twists or better dialogue.
That’s a hearty “no” on all counts.
The friction teased in the first act never materializes. The story takes sizable liberties with wolf man movie lore, which is fine assuming they’ve replaced it with something substantial. Not even close.
The “wolf man” vision gimmick adds little to the film, nor does it goose tension. It’s still better than the “new” wolf man look introduced by the film. “Wolf Man’s’ FX team strain to deviate from past creatures, but the results are dispiriting to say the least.
It looks like a deformed man with oozing skin sores, not a wolf-like threat.
Garner proved her worth in “Ozark,” but she’s been struggling to find work that mirrors that show’s intensity. Here, she’s given so little to do any competent actress could have nailed the part.
She’s far above “competent.”
Abbott captures Blake’s haunted past and wobbly present, but his character’s arc proves too restrictive to matter. Infection has its limitations.
“Wolf Man” runs out of creative steam half way through, leaving us with competently arranged action scenes and family strife, but there’s no emotional payoff to be savored.
The best wolf features end on a melancholy note. Here, the story just … ends.
Maybe it’s time for a reboot of the reboot.
HiT or Miss: “Wolf Man” starts strong and offers an original take on a shopworn character, but the film has little to do or say in its second half.
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