31 Days of Halloween: Wolf Man

2025, Leigh Whannel (The Invisible Man) -- Amazon

So, I will just roll my eyes when I am reminded this is yet another attempted "reboot" of a Universal Movie Monsters set piece. But it was a full moon, so we had to watch a werewolf movie.

Of note, we never finished Whannel's The Invisible Man because we just weren't into watching another abusive spouse movie, which is ironic because we assumed throughout this entire movie that THIS was also going to be a metaphor for male toxicity and abusive husbands, like last year's The Beast Within. I wasn't in the mood to be faked out again.

The preamble sets us in Oregon where a young Blake is raised by his angry, militaristic father on an isolated farm. These woods are known to be haunted by a curse called "hill fever" or "face of the wolf". While hunting, the two encounter an unknown snuffling, growling creature but drive it off.

Twenty-five years later Blake (Christopher Abbott, Poor Things) is an unemployed writer and stay-at-home dad living in NYC with his journalist wife Charlotte (Julia Garner, The Royal Hotel) and building a strong relationship with their daughter Ginger (Matilda Firth, Subservience). There is some tension between the two which is not helped by his request to move them to rural Oregon for the summer, so he can settle his father's affairs. His father, who has been missing for quite some time, has finally been declared legally dead. Blake has not been home in decades. 

After the obligatory fly-over shot of a winding road and dark forest, I would have assumed the story would have done the usual debate between pristine wilderness beauty and the threats just beyond the threshold of the wood, but nope, almost immediately, their moving truck crashes, the local guiding them is killed by the Unknown, and Blake is nicked by its claws. The family rushes through the dark, on foot, to his father's house, the snarling and huffing beast on their heels. The house is off the grid, no power, no phone lines, no cell reception, but all the first floor doors and windows are behind strong bars and screens. They are safe for now.

They are not safe. Blake's "infection" quickly takes hold, this curse having nothing to do with full moons. He is quickly transforming, frightening his wife and child. And frightening himself. He no longer understands them, and sees as a monster would see, clear in the dark, veins pulsing. Its been hours and he is already becoming something other than what he was. All the while, the beast that clawed him is still out there.

So, not a metaphor for an abusive husband, but a decent family oriented horror that was born from Whannel and his wife holing up for COVID 19 year, feeling isolated and imminent mortality seeping in. I wish the movie had embraced more of that original script treatment, actually given us more of that isolation and fear of an infected family member, but considering the shit show that built the movie (the umpteenth failed attempt at remaking/rebooting the 30s movie) I can see why they rushed headlong into two werewolves duking it out in the woods. Still, there was ... something there, but to be honest, Werewolf by Night had more fun with the whole wolfing out thing.

31 Days of Halloween: The Beast Within

2024, Alexander J Farrell (documentary Making a Killing) -- download

I have always enjoyed a horror movie that establishes itself strongly in the mundane, often introducing a family in a grounded manner, doing so better than other genres because the actual meat of the movie is usually so far removed from said family dynamics. What do I mean by this? A crime movie, if it shows a family in the establishing phase, they will always be either a cop family or a criminal family, inherently tied to the genre, and therefore beholden to the tropes. Many of the horror movies we watch, and I enjoy, just have "a family" or "a couple" and the horror element is put upon them.

This is not that movie. From the get go we see a family in distress tied directly to whatever is happening to them. They live in isolation, somewhere in the wilderness of England, maybe near Scotland? Willow (Caoilinn Springall, The Midnight Sky) has breathing issues and is often seen dragging a bottle of oxygen with her. She sees her mother depart with a pig in a cage. When mom returns, sans pig, she tries to act normal but there is tension everywhere: tension between mother Imogen (Ashleigh Cummings, Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries) and her father Waylon (James Cosmo, The Hole in the Ground), Imogen trying to act normal through pained expressions, Willow sensing the adults anxieties but not understanding what is going on.

When the dad Noah (Kit Harington, Eternals) finally appears wrapped in a bloody bear-skin rug (coat ???) he wants things to be normal, but they aren't. It is without spoiler warning that the movie presents itself as a werewolf movie. But immediately I am asking, "Wait, are they doing an allegory for familial abuse?" All the trappings of an abuser are there, including the being sweet when chooses to be, being all about protecting (and keeping) his family, and the sudden bursts of anger & violence. Imogen is played like someone at the centre of a true horror movie, and Cummings portrayal is probably the most true to how this movie was pitched -- that she is living each day as if she was in a horror movie.

And yet the movie plays itself as a werewolf movie up until they "oh no, they are going to fucking do it..." final scene. Yeah, the whole movie was an allegory. No werewolf, just an abuser. And it wasn't even a particularly good werewolf movie as it had to rein itself in to not be too monstrous, because the message would be lost if a monster in reality (an abuser) was less horrible than a fantasy monster. But no, the movie was a failing on all ends.

31 Days of Halloween: Viking Wolf

2022, Stig Svendson (Elevator) -- Netflix

So, was it called Viking Wolf because it was set in Norway, where everyone is descended from Vikings (/s as they on Reddit) or because they tagged on a tenuous historical preamble about Vikings bringing a werewolf cub (puppy!!) back to Norway?

Either way, grooooan.

In a lot of ways, this movie is presenting itself like one of those 80s American schlock creature features where monsters eat teenagers, but without the gratuitous nudity, and with slightly better acting. It never feels schlocky, except when the barely passable CGI werewolf appears on screen. But by the end, the movie plot seems to have escaped the writer & director and we are left with the werewolf example of the same bad parenting we just watched in the last movie, which was vampires. 

Post pre-amble, we are in modern day, small town Nybo, Norway. Thale (Elli Rhiannon Müller Osborne, Royalteen) and her family have been moved there by cop mom Liv (Liv Mjönes, Midsommar), from Oslo, after the death of Thale's father. The relationship was over before his death, and Nice Guy Arthur (Vidar Magnussen, Norsemen), Liv's new beau, is doing his best, but angry teens be angry teens. Thale sneaks out with a 6-pack to meet a boy at The Bay, the name of the local bay where kids gather to drink beer, flirt and pick on the new kids. Pretty Girl Elin (Silje Øksland Krohne, The Painting) is upset Jonas (Sjur Vatne Brean, Three Wishes for Cinderella) invited Thale and while she is yelling at him, they are attacked by a werewolf. Thale tries to intervene, but is knocked down before Elin is dragged into the brush.

Yes, I am naming all the named characters, more to bring light to the idea that other than Thale, all the characters have names palatable to the anglo tongue while their real Norwegian names are ENTIRELY fascinating ... to an anglo.

Despite saying she wasn't hurt, she must have been bitten or scratch or something, or the rest of the movie wouldn't have happened. Also, was she always exhibiting heterochromia, or was it just after the attack? If she just suddenly developed it, why isn't anyone mentioning it? 

The town brings in hunters to help find Elin, and the animal that killed her. The find her horribly mutilated body, and invite a university veterinarian to consult, a weird guy who looks barely out of high school himself and comments that it all does look like wolf, but very big wolf. And the claw they found stuck in a should high tree wound is a wolf claw but longer than normal. What exactly was the werewolf doing to lose its claw in a tree? And also, OUCH ! Pulling it out entirely would hurt. Also, the requisite weird werewolf hunter shows up in town, in his ratty camper van and offers the police advice and silver bullets. He's been hunting this werewolf his entire adult life -- he must be a terrible werewolf hunter.

In the usual way of werewolf movies, we wonder is it only a few nights later, or is it actually a month later because there are a lot of full moons, and Thale is really showing signs of being affected/infected. This will not be an unfortunate lunar based cycle -- Thale is going to convert to wolfie nature. Meanwhile the cops and the hunters actually track the beast down, get a bunch of people killed, but Liv shoots it dead with a single silver bullet. It does not turn back into a man.

Meanwhile, Thale and Jonas are dealing with their healing trauma via very chaste kissing, when the moon comes out and... well, bye bye Jonas. Thale realizes she has to leave town and catches a bus the next night. The cops are now confused about there being more than one beast. But Liv is starting to have a theory. On the bus, the movie shows its inspiration, recreating the best in werewolf change scenes from American Werewolf in London and Wolfen and now full wolf Thale eats a bunch of passengers before running home. Arthur fends her off with a lamp as she hesitates in eating her deaf little sister -- sisterhood above all, even bestial transformations!

Thale runs into town and begins eating people. The world's worst werewolf hunter shows up, smashes his ratty camper van into her and... well, I am surprised he lived this long. Maybe the original Viking Wolf was leaving him alive for fun; Thale does not. But hipster veterinarian guy shoots Thale with some tranq darts and ends the savage terrorizing of town. But will she end her daughter with a single shot from a silver bullet? Or will she leave room for a sequel? 

Fade to black.

OK, it was not terrible. But neither was it very good. There are some fun practical effects and some fun with reinventing the mythos, but it doesn't even attempt to have any internal logic and just bounds from one familiar trope to the next, as if their entire purpose was to shout, "Look! We made a werewolf movie in Norway!" The thing is, they could have actually had fun with Norse mythos and added in references to Fenrir, the hound freed at Ragnarok but they didn't even attempt to do anything about the Viking bit beyond the ludicrous preamble. 

What I Have Been Watching: Back to the TV - Pt B

What I Have Been (or Am) Watching is from The Domein of Toast, he (i) admittedly spending too much (almost all?) time in front of the TV. Kent's not stepping on toests but yeah, he (me) has a piles of TV shows in progress and maybe doesn't have has too much to say about it.

Pt. A is here.

A handfull of one-(or couple)-episoders.

Citadel, 2023, Amazon Prime

The TV is very very heavy with Spy TV this year, and I thought this would be the one that would stand out, adding a bit of Mission Impossible glitz to all the by-the-books British & American style thrillers. It has the sex appeal and sexy sexy people. It has a MacGuffin in a briefcase and even neat names for Good Guys vs Bad Guys (Citadel vs Manticore; wouldn't it be neat if a show just used two random D&D monsters as the agency names? Owlbear vs Illithid?) but whether it will stand out for me, or not, is yet to be determined because.... well, ep01 did not catch me.

Annnnd, how is that only a week and a bit since I watched the first episode, and I don't recall very much about it, at all ? I remember a fight on a train, and sexy Priyanka Chopra Jonas, and a jump forward to a memory deficit Richard Madden (he doesn't remember what happened on the train, nor who he actually is), and that's... it. I am thinking I may have fallen asleep and will have to rewatch ep1. 

The Power, 2023, Amazon Prime

Heroes from a feminist viewpoint -- it's shameful that in 2023, we are still so far away from basic, accepted by all, equal rights, to the point we have to use angry, superhero media to express the point. Or maybe in this current era of the back-treading of such rights, this show is even more needed? 

The show begins with many viewpoints focusing on the emergence of a (super)power exhibited by a subset of young girls - an electrical power. There are abused orphan Allie (Halle Bush, debut) and Seattle highschooler Jos (Auli'i Cravalho, Moana) in the US, Roxy (Ria Zmitrowicz, Mr. Selfridge) the gangster's daughter in the UK, and aspiring [not girl] reporter/YouTuber Tunde (Toheeb Jimoh, Ted Lasso) in Nigeria, who observes it happening to the girls in his town. The worldly viewpoints create the setting as a global event, literally Girl Power metaphor come to life.

It's pretty easy to see that the show will be about the ostracization of these young girls for having an ability few (want to) understand but only see as dangerous. Oh, it can be very dangerous, but I have a feeling the electrical power is just the stepping stone towards something else. Hopefully it treads more than the political statement, and gives itself room to breathe.

Wolf Pack, 2023, Paramount+

We did three episodes and this was a big a nope from me.

I had recalled this from last year as the next (big) thing for Sara Michelle Gellar (Buffy-verse) as a werewolf hunter, but only recently remembered it had already aired. I grabbed three episodes. It starts strong enough, maybe even impressively, in a massive wildfire threatening a small northern California town. Tree line burns, animals are panicking and a school bus full of kids is trapped on a jammed road. There is a stampede, and the kids are caught in it. It is a brutal, bloody, deadly encounter full of smoke and panic and ... something else hiding in the smoke, grabbing kids, biting a few, slaughtering others. But my first hint of the lunacy (pun intended) should have been recognized, when the best reaction to the terrible situation would have been GET BACK ON THE BUS. The kids weren't hiding from the fire, but from the stampede. And yet they ran around like panicking rodents. The rest of the two episodes had me yelling at the screen for all the Why Are You Doing That's.

Plot. Two of the kids are bitten during the stampede -- Blake (Bella Shepard, A Girl Named Jo) and Everett (Armani Jackson, Chad); Blake runs off because she has a shitty family situation and runs from everything, and Everett ends up in the hospital where his quickly healing injuries cause his family to give We Are Disappointed With You face, despite him being COVERED IN BLOOD. So yeah, the kids are bitten/infected, but heal quickly (look, Blake's acne healed as well, so now she's hot) and are confused about the changes happening to their bodies... groan, even I cannot continue on that usual metaphor. But wait! There are more hot teens! The Briggs twins are werewolfs too, but THEY were born that way. And that night of the fire, is also Full Moonish. There is lots of Not Talking About It (a TV trope I loathe) and shitty cops (seriously, these are possessed-by-evil-aliens level bad cops) doing weird shit (seriously, you are arson investigators, so why do you need three full squad cars to apprehend a teenager boy for QUESTIONING), giant CGI werewolf lurking in the shadows and bushes (like, downtown, where he should be very fucking obvious) and lots of horny horny teens being awkward, and horny. Well, at least the gay kid is not awkward. Just horny.

I won't be watching any more episodes, so I won't find out whether SMG is actually just a terrible arson investigator or actually a werewolf hunter who (badly) pretends to be investigating arson. Also, do they actually investigate arson during massive burn-down-towns wildfires?

What's up with that poster? Based on the few episodes I have seen, the kids are the stars, not SMG.

Silo, 2023, AppleTV+

Based on a popular post-apocalyptic novel series (Wool) that I absolutely loved. but for some reason, this show isn't doing it for me. It should have hooked me with one episode, and maybe if I hadn't read the series, I would be? I really don't get it. It's totally PA and with a grimy, rust-punk aesthetic that I should totally dig, but... it's not grabbing me, despite being very faithful to the source material. 

That paragraph was very... bipolar. And, me responding with Other Voice immediately after not so much? 

So, it's The Dark Future. People (whoever is left) live in a massive, multi-levelled silo underground. They produce food, water, electricity, raise animals on grass covered levels, and have ancient machinery that provides for everything, as long as it's kept in good repair. There was a rather big, impactful rebellion some years ago which destroyed much of the electronic archives, so they don't know what happened to stick them inside a silo, nor what is outside that keeps them trapped inside. BUT they know, via scripture level statements, that nobody goes outside, but to wipe clean the lenses that show them the wasteland outside. And nobody does that unless they profess they want to go outside, and that is the most heinous crime. Ask to go outside, and you WILL go outside. And die.

We start when the very popular Sheriff (David Oyelowo, Selma) asks to go outside. He confesses that he has been thinking about it since his wife did so years before. So then we get another even older flashback of her going outside, after getting mixed up in a conspiracy about ancient tech and ancient knowledge that they are not allowed to know. That is what inspires her to go outside. And kills her.

We are then left with an Engineer, the extremely valuable people who Keep The Lights On and she is now investigating what the Sheriff learned, and what he learned from his wife. And that's where I left off, despite the Engineer being Rebecca Ferguson (Dune) who I should be willing to watch in anything. And just might be. Not sure yet. Just not compelled. Yet.

Can someone explain to me, Why? It's PA, its Rebecca Ferguson, its rust-punk, all things I love. Why is it not grabbing me?

Hello Tomorrow! 2023, Apple TV+

Again, this should have hooked me, and it kind of did with the setting, which I absolutely love (retro-futurism) but ... it is so .... bleak?

I have this story inside my head, a story in the world of The Jetsons, but set below those houses and apartment buildings in the clouds. A grimy world that is set below the shiny plastic and robot housemaids and flying cars. This show is sort of set in that grimier world of retro-futurism, where the future was supposed to be flying cars, and living on the moon, and Optimism.

But it isn't.

Jack Billings sells dreams, dreams of a house (time share?) on the moon, in a subdivision where everything is provided for you. Given that most retro-futurism is set in that 50s-ish era when suburbs were being touted as the Only Way To Live, this clicks. Except, its all a lie. Billings may be brilliant at what he does, with a loyal crew of sales people who actually believes his bullshit, but he knows better, and during the off scenes, we see the impact. Add to the mix the now grown son he abandoned and ... wow, this is weighty. Like the bullshit story Jack is selling his chumps, I felt I was sold a bullshit story about flying cars and robots that take out the garbage, when I ended up getting a sad story about sad people doing sad things. Of course, that is the point, but...

And yet, the narrator said, he still felt compelled to continue watching it... someday.

True Lies, 2023, CBS

As I was saying, TV is heavy with the spies this year. I remember being fond of the original movie. Well, not the original original movie but the Arnie & Jamie Lee Curtis movie from 1994, which was based on a French film. So, Spy Guy living a double life, until his wife finds out.

New series by Matt Nix, who did one of our fav shows Burn Notice!! And it stars Ginger Gonzaga whom we loved in She-Hulk: Attorney at Law! We should love it! And yet, we don't. Its a big ol nope from me. Its just incredibly low-brow, low-effort TV making. All the jokes fall flat, most of the characters are cereal box cardboard thin and the plots are cookie cutter. 

FUBAR, 2023, Netflix

Meanwhile, its almost like this show was made in spite of the previous show. For one thing, it actually stars Arnold Schwarzenegger as Luke Brunner, in essentially the exact same plot as before, except with a twist (a tweest!). This time he's retiring from his international spy activity, to return home to his seemingly idyllic family life. Except its not. He's actually divorced from his wife, and is deluded enough to think he can win her back. But at least he will have his perfect daughter who adores him, right? Riiiiight?

During his retirement party, he is re-activated and sent to Guyana; the son of a cartel lord he murdered decades ago has returned to pick up where his Evil Druglord father left off. Even after Brunner funded the kid's comfy life, feeling guilty for having deceived them and left him fatherless. So, off to Guyana Brunner goes, only to find out that someone else has been previously embedded in the drug lord / arms dealer's compound -- his daughter, who has pulled a True Lies on Brunner! She's also a spy, and didn't know her dad had been one, but was recruited by the CIA who didn't bother informing Luke. Lies all around! SNAFU !

I mean fubar.

Where the other show falls entirely flat, this actually had me chuckling a number of times. For one, its entirely inappropriate, dropping f-bombs everywhere, and dripping blood whenever it can. The humour, especially from Luke's support team is on point, while actually double-downing on the quickly revealed toxic, dysfunctional family esthetic that should be there in all shows with this plot. We only watched one episode, but I will probably watch the rest, even if no one else likes it.

31 Days of Halloween: The Cursed

2021, Sean Ellis (Anthrodpoid) -- Amazon

This originally was one of our leftovers, a flick sitting in the Downloads from last year. But it showed up on streaming services, and with it came trailers, forced to watch before our other Amazon shows. They did their job, catching our our attention, and I admit, initially I did not think that this period movie about a child possessed by evil looking teeth was what we downloaded -- that looked like something about a swamp creature full of tentacles. But yeah, evil looking teeth, silver teeth. That's a weird flex. Oh there is a swamp and tentacles, but the ... teeth. <shudder>

We begin in WW1, with an officer shot by German soldiers, the field surgeon removing three bullets from him, the final one, something definitely not German... is that, a silver bullet? Fade back into memories, some 35 years prior. Where are we? England? North France? Not quite sure, but everyone but John McBride (Boyd Holbrook, The Sandman) has a French name, and there are constant references to McBride's previously tragic encounter with the Beast of Gévaudan, a historical encounter with a great monster (or multiple creatures) that slew many many people and livestock, a real world event gave rise to many a related werewolf story. McBride lost his wife and child to it, and was tracking down Roma who were said to be connected to the beast.

The horror begins after the landlord refuses the claims of the "travelers" on his land, murdering them all instead of giving them the land they claim as their own. Everyone who watches horror movies knows that nothing good ever comes of slighting the Roma. Soon after the children of the village are possessed by dreams, a number of them are compelled to dig up the teeth that the Roma witch had crafted just before she and all her people were killed. Why teeth? Who knows; they are creepy. Teeth in mouth (dude, DON'T put that in your mouth) the biggest boy bites Edward (Max Mackintosh, Rocketman), the son of the landlord, before running off to hide. The young boy, who we know to be the officer wounded in the opening scenes, takes ill from the bite, and we see him writhing with vines or tentacles before disappearing into the wood.

McBride shows up, tasked with finding the boy and dealing with whatever beast has now slain the boy who originally bit Edward. We know what is going on, and how its going to go, or we wouldn't have that opening scene. So, yeah a pseudo werewolf story, as Edward the Beast wanders the countryside slaying whomever he comes across, and anyone who survives sickens and is in turn infected by the tentacles/vines, becoming yet another beast. At this point, I was wondering if this was more a werewolf story or a pale shadow of The Thing. But no matter, what plays out is a decent enough creature feature which is satisfying if nothing novel. 

Any regular reader of this season knows that I don't require new to enjoy the movie, just a modicum of style and skill. I would have preferred a bit more stretching out of the connection between silver coins and teeth and Roma curses, beyond some thin references to the 30 pieces of silver from the Bible, and nursery rhymes which lend themselves to the original title of the movie, Eight for Silver. I could get crankier for some of the clumsy plot building, such as, "Why do we need the WWI opening?" or "What's with the scant attempts at sexual tension between McBride and the landlord's wife (Kelly Reilly, Eden Lake) ?" but it's early in the season and at least it was not that exorcism movie (*snicker*).

I Saw This!! What I Have Been Watching: A Long Long Look Back, Pt. E - I Suppose They're All Radomalia

I Saw This (double exclamation point) is our feature wherein Kent(!) or Toasty attempt to write about a bunch of stuff they watched some time ago and meant to write about but just never got around to doing so. But we can't not write cuz that would be bad, very bad.  Freedumb Convoy bad.

What I Have Been (or Am) Watching is the admitted state of me spending too much time in front of the TV. But what else was the last few years about? Sure, we got a few breaks from being confined at home, and might have actually gone outside (gasp!) and socialized with (double-gasp!) human beings (faint-dead-away) but we always ended up back on the sofa, flicker in hand, trying to find something to watch amidst the 35 shows we downloaded, and the 5 or so streaming services we are subscribed to.

Part A is here. Part B is here. Part C is here. Part D is over there. 

And yet, I still regularly go looking for something new to watch. I just need something to enthrall me, something to entertain me long enough to not pick up my phone 10,000 times, something that doesn't have me nodding off after one 9pm stout. 

Only Murders in the Building, 2021, Hulu/download

Kent wrote about it closer to when it actually came out, but I wasn't writing about TV then.

I actually loved this show, and it fit much closer to what I wish to watch, when using my time... well. You see, we have our "shows of the season", those shows we actively look to download or catch week to week on a streaming service. Most keep my attention, or we wouldn't make the effort, but few enthrall me. This did. Maybe not in the obsessive way the main characters obsessed over true crime podcasts, but at least I put my phone down.

Brazzos Charles-Haden Savage (Steve Martin, The Jerk; and not Thomas Haden Church), Oliver Putnam and Mabel Mora (Selena Gomez, The Dead Don't Die; ohhhh those NAMES !) live in the Arconia, a high-end, Upper West Side Manhattan (it always seems necessary to identify the section of NYC, to impart... socioeconomic placement) apartment building. Savage had a run on a popular copy show (Brazzos), Putnam had some mild success on Broadway and Mora is basically squatting in her rich aunt's apartment claiming to be renovating it. They don't know each other and very likely would not like each other, but for the murder of a fellow tenant and their shared fondness for true crime podcasts. None of them are really doing much, but Oliver needs a new success, or he will lose everything, so he drags the other two into doing their own podcast in order to sleuth out who killed Tim Kono.

The production values! The sets! The costuming! That coat! The jacket! Yes, the outfits Mabel wears, the ensembles of vintage choices, make her as iconic as LoFi Girl, but really all three dress definitively and live in incredibly distinctive locations. It may be shallow, but to me it tells of commitment to the production when they spend more than a bit on the set dressing.

The first episode was great, but the second felt a bit off kilter, prompting me to wonder if this was going to be the kind of series where different writers/directors would append their own views to the characters as well as the plots, something I always find jarring. I cannot remember the exact point, but something felt off about Martin's Savage character in the second episode. But I was happy it pulled back for the rest, and despite some rather creative choices made to subsequent episodes, it still all felt cohesive as a single series. And a great one!

Wolf Like Me, 2022, Amazon

** Spoiler Warning -- There is no point in talking about this show without spoiling it; but even the mention that there are spoilers might spoil something about it.

I had no interest in this series. The trailer did a great job of showing us a series that was probably about a metaphor, a woman with something dark and weird in her life, one that makes her spontaneously run away from the potential love interest. I expected it would be quirky but ultimately just another *yawn* metaphor for how hard life is. But Marmy started watching, so I stayed in the room.

Bing! It wasn't a metaphor. Of course she has to run away, and usually once a month, because she's a werewolf. I love werewolfs! Werewolves? Meh, werewolfs. So, yeah I love me some wolfie story, and despite my usual aversion to Josh Gad, I rather enjoyed this series. In fact, we pretty much binged it over three nights.

Gary (Josh Gad, Frozen) is an American living in Australia, the home of his late wife. He's not dealing well with her death, despite it being seven years prior, and is struggling to raise his daughter.  They bump into Mary (Isla Fisher, Arrested Development), and keep bumping into her. Mary is weird, and despite her connecting with Gary's daughter quite easily, she pulls away, or more accurately... runs away.

You see, as a werewolf, she has to run home once a month, close up her house bunker style, lock herself in the basement and ... change. She doesn't want to kill anyone (else) so lives off chickens, goats, etc. whatever she can get from suppliers, usually animals that didn't have long to live to begin with. When Mary was initially infected/cursed, she ate her husband and another nice couple on holidays. So she is rather hesitant to connect with Gary and his daughter, despite feeling some sort of destiny inspired connection to the two.

Gad is tolerable doing more drama than comedy, conveying a man who has never recovered from his loss, but is open to something new. Fisher's role is typical for her, kind of quirky, introspective and cute. It was a short "mini series" but just perfect considering what it wanted to present, and ends on a reveal that could lead somewhere, but doesn't have to.

The Book of Boba Fett, 2022, Disney+

A coworker, after I confessed I had an irrational dislike for Timothée Chalamet, asked what I thought of the mods in The Book of Boba Fett. I was luke-warm on them initially, not seeing how they fit into the Star Wars universe, but once I caught onto the joke (Mods vs Rockers) and saw that their speeder bikes were decked-out Vespas, I began to love them. It was such a terrible in-joke, that there has to be something sly going on there. But, in general, I could see how most straight-forward Star Wars Fans would loathe them, and with good reason. After the turmoil that was the final three movies in the franchise, Star Wars Fans are not up for different.

Boba is definitely different, despite the loads of fan service from other sources, as it takes the fan fav character, digs him out of the gut of the Sarlacc, and has him decide to become the new crime boss on Tattooine. Sure, weird flex, as the kids say, but as a trailer born plot point, it was kind of exciting. But for the point that he does such a terrible terrible job of going about it.

I loved watching each episode of this show, even as I watched him make terrible choices. It should have been a bad joke that he kept ending up back in the bakta tank. I think their intent was to say that is how legendary characters keep on coming back -- take tons of damage, one Cure Serious Wounds spell, and back to the action! But the fact he kept on getting battered & knocked around by just about every foe must have infuriated the fan who saw Boba as an epic warrior.

The two episodes of The Mandalorian were intentionally meant to be a catch up, but felt very very weird, even if you ignored Deep Fake Luke. I just felt that being so jarringly pulled out of the main plotline unnecessary, when they could have hinted at the changes, and left the full reveal to his next season.

But the fan service was incredible, even if you didn't know the characters from other sources, as they were just fun choices, especially Black Krrsantan.

Ken't take, and my original comment, as I wasn't expect to write about it at that time. We pretty much agree.

31 Days of Halloween: I Am Lisa

2020, Patrick Rea (Conspiracy World) -- Amazon

Remind me next year, horror fans (myself included, I guess) are the worst judge of what is considered "good" in the genre. This flick showed up on a small handful of "best werewolf movies", and either there were just not any "good" werewolf movies or their judgement is impaired. Probably a bit of both.

This was a terrible movie. Bad plot, bad acting, bad directing, even fucking terrible photography. Jaysus dude, either get a better camera or don't shoot those types of night scenes. There was so much snow/grain on that shot we thought it was actually snowing for a second. Also, solid colour filters do not make mood.

And yet, we gave it the full run. It seemed like an indie flick, a low budget dear, that would rise through story and performance. Don't get me wrong, this was not so low in the barrel, so low-budget, that it felt like the student flicks Amazon is littered with. In fact, you could see by their pretty decent cast size and different sets that they had some money to play with. AND you would think that the director, with so many shorts and other features under his belt would have ... learned something? Alas... 

How is it, that we can watch so many horror movies where the director is getting his first feature, after a few critically acclaimed shorts, and whether its The Best New Thing or not, at least you can see the skill played out. They have potential. This guy is pretty much like me writing this blog -- still doing the same terrible stuff after a looooong time doing it. The 10,000 hours to expertise thing doesn't always apply.

OK, what was the movie about? Lisa has come back to her small town to run her grandmother's used book store, after getting a "fancy degree" in records management in Spain (?!?!). The town skanks/bullies show up and drive all her customers away and steal a first edition. Maybe not have the first editions lying around in random stacks? But nobody will do anything about it because Head Skank is the daughter of the town Sheriff. And the Sheriff is corrupt. Also, we got a preamble where a girl in bad pseudo-werewolf makeup (y'know, plastic teeth, contact lenses) is killed by said Sheriff.

The bullying escalates where Sheriff decides to let Head Skank beat her up, pull out fingernails, let her son rape Lisa (crass; not needed, another sign of a bad director to let that choice stand) and leave her in the woods to die, eaten by wolves. But instead she is bitten by a werewolf who can be driven away by a thunk to the head with a rock. But Lisa is bitten!

So, typically indie plot where girl bitten by werewolf begins to change slowly and takes revenge on those who wanted her dead. We can take those kind of plots as long as they do some fun things. But nope; they don't. They also continually hint at some darker story going on behind the Sheriff's rise to power and why she seems to make werewolves. BUT THEY NEVER EXPLAIN ANYTHING ! There is literally no reason, no motivation, nothing behind what the Sheriff and her horrible family does other than corruption. Werewolves? Meh, just something they play with. Sheriff's sister is all knowledgeable on the supernatural and at odds with her sister. Why? No fucking reason. This is one of those situations where someone says "let's have the evil sheriff make werewolves!!" and then not actually come up with a reason why. Many of the decisions in this movie were in the same tone. This movie was just bad.

Horror, Not Horror: Werewolves Within

 "Horror, Not Horror" movies are those that toe the line of being horror movies but don't quite comfortably fit the mold.  I'm not a big horror fan (Toast is the horror buff here), but I do quite like these line-skirting type movies, as we'll see.

2021, John Ruben - netflix

So let's say you're tasked with writing a screenplay for a film based off a tabletop game where the participants try to work out who amongst them is the murderer...or werewolf...or both.  Where do you turn to for inspiration?

Werewolves Within is written by comedian/author Mishna Wolff, and stars comedy performers Sam Richardson, Milana Vayntrub, Michaela Watkins, Harvey Guillén, Sarah Burns, Cheyenn Jackson and others.  Nobody is a huge name, but most of these are probably "hey, it's that guy from that thing" and they're all dependable character actors and comedic presences.  Altogether, that spells a very different "horror" movie, except that's the bait-and-switch.  Werewolves Within is not a horror movie at all but a sort of madcap "whodunnit" (or perhaps "whoisit") that quite clearly takes its inspiration from the 1984 board-game adaptation classic (yeah, I said it) Clue.

Clue was a murder mystery comedy filled with bigger name comedic players all portraying characters with outsized personalities in a film whose whole point was to toy with the audience by creating an unsolvable mystery (one whose obfuscated clues could still work with no less than three different endings).  Werewolves Within doesn't go quite as ambitious as to have three different endings, but it works very hard, and very adeptly, at making everyone in the closed door/confined small town mystery a viable suspect to be the werewolf.  Grudges are set-up, fraught histories established, tensions are played out, and the acrimony is fierce, thinly veiled under neighbourly pretexts.  It doesn't take much for everyone to throw everyone else under the bus and point fingers (and guns...small town America is well armed).

Beyond just the delightful hysterics, and the ever-so-adorable will-they/wont-they of perky/confident mail carrier Vayntrub and stammering/optimistic new-to-town Ranger Richardson, there's a scathing view of America in a microcosm, taking aim at both the extreme right and left, and the people that exploit them, as well as jabs at science vs superstition/faith/belief, and the bitter cynicism directed at positivity and earnestness.  In the end, the philosophy is kind of that America will wind up eating itself as proven by the Grand Guignol of mishaps and murders that take place in the third act of the film.

This is a damn fun movie, just super entertaining with winning performances all around, and still managing social commentary without shoving any particular agenda down the viewer's throat, except maybe perhaps just be genuinely nicer to each other.  I could see this being as beloved as Clue, if only we weren't so inundated with content all the time.

BUT, hey, is it horror?

Nope, it's comedy, it's farce, and maybe even mystery, but it's not horror.

[Toast's take: we agree]

Horror, Not Horror: Trifecterror

 "Horror, Not Horror" movies are those that toe the line of being horror movies but don't quite comfortably fit the mold.  I'm not a big horror fan, but I do quite like these line-skirting type movies, as we'll see.

She Dies Tomorrow (2020, d. Amy Seimetz) - AmazonPrime
Love and Monsters (aka "Monster Problems" -  2020, d. Michael Matthews) - Netflix
The Wolf of Snow Hollow (2020, d. Jim Cummings [not the famous voice actor]) - Crave

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This pandemic-laden reality we're living in is taking its toll, not just in lives lost, but in life lost, as in the time we're losing from being able to do much of anything in the name of keeping ourselves (and just as importantly, others) safe... or as safe as possible.  There are, of course, those radical "freedom fighters" who refuse to lock down or mask up or get vaccinate because "liberties", whatever that means, when in reality all they're doing is putting themselves and others at risk of catching this miserable virus, and prolonging the time it's going to take to try and establish the "new normal".  Looking around the world, at the places that got their shit together... Australia, Israel, China among others... that are finding their new normal right now, and comparing them to the worst case scenarios like India, Brazil, and even the not-quite-yet worst case scenarios like Canada, and it's hard not to let the mind spiral into doomsday thoughts.  I give into that temptation too often, and it's beyond even depressing, it's just too massive to even contemplate except through the lens of what I've seen in film and television.  We have a virus that, anywhere it's allowed to run rampant, starts mutating, and the mutations become more easily transmittable with our newly established vaccinations being less effective.  At a certain point, your brain becomes numb to these thoughts and you become resigned to the fact that maybe things have gone south.

She Dies Tomorrow, from writer/director (and actress, but not in this one) Amy Seimetz, effectively captures this existential sense of looming dread in a story that finds one character telling another character how certain they are that they will not live beyond the following day, and soon that person starts to feel the same way, telling someone else, who tells someone else, who tells someone else, and so on and so on.  The film was not made about the pandemic.  It was more a manifestation of Seimetz's anxiety attacks, but it fits so well for the current cultural narrative.  Even before COVID, it resonates with thoughts of the environmental turmoil, divisive political and societal structures, and the prevalence of feeling-based belief systems that cause people to act very irrationally that all kind of feel very foreboding. 

The spread of this thinking acts like a contagion and before long it's everywhere, and there doesn't appear to be any effort to turn it around.   It's not necessarily horrific, and at times there's a very black barb of comedy situated just underneath, but at the same time there's always a weight to it.  I think, especially these days, its easy enough to emphasize with someone who is absolutely convinced that something is the truth, despite any physical evidence.  Likewise it's easy to emphasize with the people they're encountering who try to handle this news as best as they can, with either placation, sympathy, frustration or vehement rejection.  The scariest thing is that there's no resolution here, and no "cure" for what is affecting them.  One character tries to experience joy, another just tries to continue working, others just panic, still others just get stoned and mellow out.  There's a broad spectrum.

Having stared anxiety attacks in the face, I know how hard it is to reassure someone that everything is okay when their brain can only tell them the worst case scenario is the only outcome.  In that regard, the film finds its allegory well, but it feels so much bigger than one mind, by the sheer fact that it's contagious dread.

The faces here are all "that guy(*cough*) person" quite familiar - Kate Lyn Sheil (You're Next), Jane Adams (Eternal Sunshine...), Chris Messina (Birds of Prey), Katie Astleton (Legion), Tunde Adebimpe (Marriage Story), and each has their own experience with feeling their impending end is coming.   This also isn't John Dies At The End in which the title acts as some arch spoiler for the film, instead it's more the thesis.  

I liked this.  It's not very long at 84 minutes, but it does what it sets out to do effectively in that time.  Seimetz's production style feels very guerilla, but there are moments of visual inspiration which signal much bigger things to come from her.

But, we ask, is it horror?
Going to have to say no, it never quite gets there, but it's just on the other side of line.  It's like it's looking in the direction of horror but shying away from really going there.

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I had completely forgotten that Toasty had written about Love and Monsters when I watched it.  I mean, he wrote about it back in October during his annual 31 Days of Halloween and Netflix announced it as a new release mid April of this year while also touting it as a Netflix film.  It only got more bizarre when, through my cable provider, it was promoting the film as a new release only under the title "Monster Problems" (which apparently was its original title up until *just* before it's VOD and limited theatrical release last year).  It was all such a bizarre thing.

It was a very disarming watch, because the title seemed to insinuate another eye-rolling teenage romance in a genre setting, and it opens with, basically, a virtual apocalypse.  Without going into specifics (Toasty goes more into it in his review) what's left of humanity huddles in caves and missile silos and fallout shelters and the like, away from the surface where the fauna of Earth has mutated into gigantic creatures, most of which are keen on humans as snack food. Now, this sounds pretty dire, and it should feel pretty dire, but the film adopts a pithy, light-touch voiceover from our main character, Joel, played by the most average-y average early-20's white guy Dylan O'Brien (The Maze Runner).  That's not a diss, but a credit to O'Brien making Joel out to be a supremely average, if not just subtly below-average guy, as was necessitated by the script.  Joel needs to be a shaky, nervous, unaccomplished type in order to make his adventure seem that much bolder and grander.  The actual explanation for the apocalypse as presented in the film is 100% comic-book science, and man do I love it.  It's like "this is our idea, it's completely implausible, but just don't worry about that, we're gonna have some fun".

And we do.

That adventure finds him leaving the comfort (well...barely comfortable) surroundings of an old missile silo, where he has a makeshift family of other survivors roughly the same age as him... only they are all paired off and seem much more capable adults than he is.  After 7 years of searching the CB radio dial for other survivor colonies he finds the one where his old high school girlfriend, Aimee (Iron Fist's Jessica Henwick), has made refuge and makes the bold choice to trek to the coast to be with her.

This puts Joel on the surface where he encounters plenty of monsters, makes friends who teach him a few things and of course winds up at his destination only to find that what's waiting for him is not what he expected.

I really dug the adventure here.  The creature designs were delightful... intimidating but cool.  The next step from taking a real animal and making it gargantuan and mutated was handled so well, since nature would be pretty intimidating if humanity suddenly dropped a half dozen rungs down the food chain ladder.  I also liked that the film dealt with Joel's unhealthy fixation on Aimee and his inability to move on.  For Joel, it was all he had left from his old life, and the only hope he had for the future, which is a lot to put on someone.  It's only when he arrives at his destination that he realizes this, but the fact that he does indeed realize it, and on his own no less, was certainly a welcome touch.  There's a fine line between grand romantic gestures and unhealthy obsession and this film understands that sometimes they're one and the same.  But it gets to the root of that unhealthy obsession and addresses it.

The third act is, as with any post-apocalyptic scenario, the usual third act, where the worst thing the survivors have to face is other survivors.  It's the unfortunate reality, that the worst people will likely do anything it takes to survive, even if it means fucking over the rest of humanity.  But this typical story is usually presented as horror, where here it's more kind of high adventure and even comedy.  That unusual pithy tone and laissez-fair attitude towards the post-apocalypse seemed like such an odd choice for the first two acts but pays off nicely in the Goonies-style finale.

My favourite part of the film is that Joel, a terrible artist in high school, has become a rather excellent one 7 years later.  He puts his talent to use creating a monster field guide, which I would love to see a copy of. 

This isn't a huge movie, a big record-breaking blockbuster, but it's a delightful, fun, spirited, genre-laden PG-13-style adventure film that just stimulates my geek brain and I will definitely be coming back to on regular occasions.  Despite it's Po-Ap surroundings, it's a warm, welcoming, and vibrant movie that welcomes you along for the ride.

Yeah, but is it horror?
Not so much.  It's "horror" in the same way, like, Godzilla movies were horror.  In that they're not really horror at all, but at the root there is a horror concept, it's just not executed to horrify, but to entertain and excite.

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In that same 31 Days of Halloween, Toasty reviewed The Wolf of Snow Hollow, and unlike Love and Monsters, that one did stick in my brain. Seriously, go read his review and try not to be intrigued by Toast's perplexed and somewhat impressed response (the last paragraph's a spoiler though).

I think I was expecting something even weirder that this, but, even still, it's plenty weird.  Actually, I think I was expecting something differently weird.  This one's weird is... (I'm fighting so hard not to say "weird" right now) certainly unexpected.  Toast's review alludes to writer/director/lead star Jim Cummings' very off-kilter performance and that's the centerpiece of this film's weirdness.  The film opens with a series of panoramic shots over the credits that alternate between normal vistas and an upside-down vantage point, signifying things are going to be regularly turned on its head in this one.  We spend time with a young couple on a romantic engagement getaway, only to have the woman be murdered...or perhaps attacked by a wolf or creature.  We're introduced to Cumming's character, John, at an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting where he offers up an unpleasant "what I'd like to do to my ex-wife" scenario that is even more disturbing given that he's the Sheriff of Snow Hollow (well, technically his dad - the late, great Robert Forster - is the Sheriff but he's got a heart condition he's not dealing with which causes John no end of anxiety).

When we see John in action at the murder scene, it's just dizzying layers of interaction, with John talking to all his fellow deputies and his father and others, and it's a fine line whether John's in charge or just being an asshole.  The weight of the murder and the investigation and his father's neglected illness, as well as negotiating his teenage daughter sends John to his breaking point and he starts drinking again.  And once John starts drinking, the film is told in the abstract narrative of a drunk, with random thoughts, memories, fears entering his consciousness while he's trying to focus on work and family and everything.  The reality is, his drinking affects everything and the portrait here is of a man a slave to his devices but so desperate to give the appearance of being in control.  But his sense of control, especially at work, seems simply reckless. He fires more than one person throughout the investigation, mainly because John, well, he's kind of an asshole, even more so when he's drunk.

There's a quasi-murder mystery underneath all this, but it's just one of the driving factors in John's story, it's not the only story and it's not the main story.  That the film doesn't even really give us the option of piecing together the mystery or devising our own suspect list speaks to the fact that it's not playing at a true murder mystery.  Couple that with the fact that it point blank shows us a wolfman attacking a couple of his victims (and only when there's a full moon) only heightens the fact that something supernatural may in fact be occurring.  But John only entertains the idea of werewolves in trying to understand where the origin of the myth comes from.  In fact, the film holds back *just* enough to keep John on the table as a suspect without anyone ever verbalizing it.  I think Cummings did that intentionally, to leave the audience just *hoping* that it's not John, because that would be a bad twist.

Turns out there's no twist here, except to say that John is an alcoholic, maybe even a functional alcoholic, and this film is a murder mystery and family drama and irreverant black comedy that shows how that disease gets in the way of someone who want to be in control of everything actually having no control at all.

The real hero of the film is Riki Lindhome's Detective Julia Robson, who, were this a season of Fargo would be the absolute lead of this thing. 

Can it be horror though?
Maybe a little.  Where She Dies Tomorrow never thinks about jumping over the line into anything outright horror, The Wolf of Snow Hollow steps over the line cheekily like a child stepping past the yellow line on the subway platform then quickly stepping back like they did something really daring.

31 Days of Halloween: The Wolf of Snow Hollow

 2020, Jim Cummings (Thunder Road) -- download

What the fuck are we watching? What the fuck did we just watch? This is a very weird movie. Is this supposed to be drama? Horror? Comedy? Black comedy? Farce? These are things that came out of my mouth while watching this ultimately very entertaining movie about a beastly creature killing women in a small ski town in the mountains. But really, all the entertainment value came from Cummings himself, who also starred as interim town Sheriff John Marshall, who has a drinking problem, anger issues and an astounding inability to deal with stress.

When the first pretty blonde is killed, literally torn apart, Marshall is already dealing with his father (Robert Forster, Mulholland Drive) who won't step down from Sheriff despite a very obvious heart issue. Having to deal with a horrific murder is not helping either men. From almost the get go, things go awry as Marshall deals with the locals (all buffoons), the press (all blaming the police for ineptitude) and his own staff, who keep on saying & doing inappropriate things, all except Officer Robson (Riki Lindhome, Knives Out), the perpetual straight man of the movie, and only capable person. After another woman & child are horrifically killed, many believe the town has a werewolf problem.

The movie keeps you unbalanced, no not as unbalanced as Marshall who gets worse and worse as time goes by, firing people, shouting at everyone, resuming his alcoholism and just behaving in a manner that serves no one. I am not sure if Cummings was doing comedy, or acting badly, but the way he played Marshall is hilarious and weird, as the anger he exhibits seems to come from a place lacking any emotion, just louder and louder, and his dialogue gets longer, and then, abruptly, he just shuts it off. 

In the end it is not a werewolf, which considering the brutality of the attacks, I am still not sure was the real conclusion. Sure, the attacker looked like a guy in a suit, because he was a guy in a suit, but the ferocity and speed with the people are dispatched should have precluded a normal man. And then there was that scene with one of the cops found stuffed into a garbage can, all broken & severed limbs. That death is quickly forgotten about, as the movie rushes to a conclusion. I was left feeling the unhinged nature of the film was reflecting back the unhinged nature of Marshall, and maybe Cummings.

31 Days of Halloween 2015: Late Phases

2014, Adrián García Bogliano -- download

So, follow werewolves on a train with werewolves in a retirement village. Yes, seriously.

In the world of indie horror, often the concept is king. The execution is secondary, because getting enough funding to hire & film is primary and what is left over is used for effects and whatever. This time it really shows. They pump all the budget into the skin ripping scenes, ever popular since The Howling and very very little to the actual were. Its a little better than the man in a fur suit from Blood Moon but not much better.

Marmy downloaded this one because it stars Nick Damici from Stake Land. He is not old enough to be playing the retired Vietnam veteran in this movie, but add a bit of white makeup to his hair and we are supposed to buy it. I didn't.

Basically a young guy, Ethan Emry who bought it after only one episode on The Walking Dead dumps his dad in a nice, small retirement village on the edge of a big, bad wood. Residents keep on being eaten by a wild dog, one that jumps fences, plows through doors and rips the residents to shreds. But the local sheriff doesn't care. At first I thought he must be in on it, but no, the movie isn't that smart. They want to stress this is the place where people go to die and dispense with any plot holes that might create.

Its a terrible movie. Damici shows up, angry at his son, angry and snippy at everyone else, but kicks it into high gear after hearing his neighbour torn apart. Oh, forgot to mention -- he is blind and refuses a cane (even though its been years) and only gets really angry after his dog is torn apart. No, this is no John Wick. So, Viet Vet (are Vietnam vets still a thing in anyone's mind?) finds the local silver bullet smith (yes, the town has one) and goes up against the born again Christian werewolf, said man in the fur suit. And some senior citizen weres he creates for good measure. The vet defeats them and dies in uniform. Sigh.

Days of Halloween 2015: Howl

2015, Paul Hyett (special effects guy on a ton of stuff) -- download

Speaking of werewolves; werewolves on a train !!  Followed soon after by weresnakes on a... ahh, skip it.

Yeah, this one, in premise, is kind of lame. Its a closed room story where a train breaks down in a wooded area with a legendary breakdown years ago, where lots of people unexplainedly died. Guess what, this one will probably be unexplained as well.

The thing about werewolf movies is whether you go Full Wolf or not. Most go mid-Wolf, which is a hairy human body with a wolf head. Some have the conversion to full, because its easier to CGI in stunt wolves. And then some go with the icky hybrid, some they can highlight that they have a good special effects guy. And considering Hyett's background in rubber monsters, this one better look good. They kind of do, in that weird, elongated merging of beast and man look.

So, commuters on a train to or from London... I have to admit, I only wandered in after the credits had rolled. It was the end of this run and I was running out of energy and not committing [ed note. kind of like writing these]. And I didn't think that this was going to require a lot of brain investment. I missed how the train breaks down, but driver (8?) Alfred the Butler (Sean Pertwee playing the recognizable face) gets out to inspect. Munch munch. Yes, he only took the role as a brief appearance; easy paycheck, his name on the credits did their job. Now onto munching the unknowns.

Closed rooms always have a rag taggle of people -- the asshole, the whiny bitch (get it get it !!), the old folks and the tough guy. And of course, the middle of the road man or woman -- usually the hero(es). They are all jammed together, annoyed their commute home has been interrupted followed by annoyed they are all being eaten. They squabble, bitch at each other and only after a few losses, band together to defend themselves. P.S. Why do they continue to sit with their backs to the many many windows on a train?

Like most horror movies of this ilk, the monsters hide in the bushes until a key point in the story, and then we get a full on reveal. We get to see the monster effects in its full glory, and while technically its rather good, man are they icky. Think elongated beast people with not wolfy but bestial heads, pale skin and long claws. As the train is not expected to have a lot of silver bullets, this myth is sidestepped and they just smash a were until he is pulp. I never understood how massive amounts of damage were not going to kill a monster only susceptible to one element -- either you go with instantaneous healing or unbreakable skin. But if you crush his skull with a fire extinguisher, I am not sure how you heal that.

This movie was as fun as you would expect a "werewolves on a ________" movie to be, with no real introspection on the genre, just slashing, munching tension and action.

31 Days of Halloween 2015: Wer

2013, William Brent Bell (The Devil Inside) -- download

More werewolves!

Back when Marmy and I were getting to know each other, she mentioned a vampire interest. It was the Anne Rice era, so I bought her some books. Lots of books. In contrast, I mentioned my love of werewolves and she got me a copy of The Werewolf of Paris. I loved it. But this is how memory works; I was convinced it was a fictionalized account of the Beast of Gevaudan, an historical account of a large wolf in south-central France, that killed many people. Alas, no, no connection at all. Memory can be funny that way, as I now have no recollection of how I even know about this beast.

Wer is about a rather bestial looking man charged with the horridly brutal deaths of some campers, including their young son. The camping area happens to be near Gevaudan, which made me chuckle. AJ Cook (from Criminal Minds) is the American working as a defender in France and takes on this case; her focus is human rights issues, cases where it's likely her client will be taken advantage of. Talan suffers from a form of porphyria, which until now I knew only to be the vampire's disease, responsible for his abnormal hair growth and enlarged bone growth. Even without the accusations, Talan is a monster, over 6 feet with massive hands and a bestial look.

Of course, he is the monster.

The movie really picks up once it dispenses with the pseudo science misdirection and pseudo found footage. He doesn't so much as wolf out, but grow a little larger, a little hairier and immensely stronger. On France national TV he tosses about SWAT cops (hmm, I need to Google the French version) smashing them like so much rag dolls. AJ is no longer seeking to protect him but feels responsible for letting it get this far, including the fact her ex was scratched and is showing signs of the same infection. OK, a little pseudo science is left.

I never expect werewolf movies to be good, but if they have something I can sink my teeth into -- get it get it -- then I am happy. The depiction of Talan (talon! get it get it) is wonderful, a truly wolfish man with the strength of a bear. The brief scenes where his bones crack and reform as he expands are well done, subtle, without any skin pulling and shredding.

The movie ends with a cliffhanger, or at the very least, a hint of an opening to a sequel. There is a market for these movies in Europe, in Uwe Boll proves anything, and it was decently done instead of his horrendous productions.

31 Days of Halloween 2015: Blood Moon

2014, Jeremy Wooding -- download

So, low budget does not always mean low quality. In this case, very much so. Imagine a group of RPGers got together and decided to play a game of Boot Hill (the 1980s old west RPG) but mix it up with a bit of Halloween flavour -- add werewolves. Then they decide to LARP it. Then they decide that was so spectacular, it should be a movie. And that movie goes to Cannes and gets a distribution deal. I am not saying that is how this movie was made, but damn, that was how it felt. That was how it was scripted, directed and acted.

A stage coach full of travellers ends up in an abandoned town where they are set upon by some cartoon bank robbers, or at least that is what they sounded like to me. And I mean, close your eyes and think back to all those overly exaggerated cowboy villain voices you hear in cartoons -- now apply it to a couple of recognizable supporting actors playing the Norton Brothers. The only thing they were missing was the hat with the front flap folded up. The stage coach crowd consists of a marshall and his new wife, a preacher, a newspaper man from England, a sexy widow and a well dressed gun fighter. Almost immediately they are besieged by the werewolf. And killed off, so we don't get confused with too many NPCs.

Meanwhile a Sheriff from a nearby town is tracking the bank robbers with his drunken Indian sidekick. Other than being an offensive stereotype, she also exists to be exposition on Native American skinwalkers, so the movie can claim to have some mythological relevance to the Old West.

The movie wants to be a Bottle Episode, or single location, as the focus takes place inside the saloon in the abandoned town, with a limited number of characters in conflict with each other and the external danger.... but they keep on going outside. They also don't seem to be very scared. Oh the gunfighter should be the fearless one, as he seems to be the DM's favourite NPC with a mysterious, possible mystical background, but everyone else should be peeing their pants. Nope; everyone has no issue bucking up to fight the big hairy.

Said gunfighter also keeps on spouting a line that I think the writers believe we should know. When asked where he is from he answers, "I'd tell ya, but I don't think you'd have heard of it." Three times. Anyone know where that is from? Consider they make a tenuous connection to The Lost Boys, as the gunfighter was apparently on his way to Santa Carla to fight red eyed demons. Maybe it is a cowboy movie reference.

As for the werewolf himself, calling it a man in a rubber suit would be complimentary. It is a man in an old gorilla costume with a bad rubber werewolf head. It was just terrible, not even good enough to be considered a Halloween costume. From what I read elsewhere, even the director was not aware at how bad it looked till he saw it in a screening. See? The power of the table top RPG !

Now, normally, werewolf movies end with the reveal, changed back to human scene, and we recognize the werewolf from somewhere. Nope, other than the drunken Indian, who happened to also be a skinwalker, or half-skinwalker or whatever, hearing another wolf howl at the end, once the besieging werewolf is dead, the movie ends. Not sure if they understand how movies are supposed to end, but if it was just the DM pushing himself back from the table, all makes sense.

One Episode: Bitten, The After, Crisis

Bitten is an original Space channel series about werewolves.  It is based on a book series by Kelly Armstrong and is set in Toronto, for the most part.  Elena is the only female werewolf having been changed by an ex-boyfriend and now lives apart from the pack. But try as hard as she can to keep away, they will keep dragging her back in.

This is CW lite fare. With a little bit more nudity than American stations allow, the werewolves are all pretty, buff boys with blonde, lithe Laura Vandervoort (Kara/Supergirl from Smallville) as the lead. The first episode reveals her difficulty in leading a normal life without giving into the change and the hunt. It is likened to a psychological addiction where you need release, but in this case, if you don't do at least a little skin walking, you might wolf out and eat your neighbours.

That is the central plot of the first episode, as someone is eating girls in a park, and suspicion is cast on her or maybe its just on a rogue werewolf, a mutt. That is why the pack draws her back to upstate New York to discuss her place in the werewolf world, to flaunt around in expensive clothes and give sideways looks at each other. They are werewolves, so you know they will never really get along.

It was boring. Not even CW tantalizing, because if we are only get one female werewolf, then its meant for the female population. I am so far outside its demographic,  I am not sure why we downloaded it. I am not against that, it just didn't do anything for me. Slick, decently produced and full of nice locations and well dressed people. But I want more wolf and less soap opera.

Meanwhile, we get The After, from Chris Carter (The X-Files) by way of Amazon. The pilot aired on the Internet (Amazon's streaming service, I would assume, though its not available in Canada) and that has been about it. It must have been so under the radar, nobody has even provided a decent Wikipedia summary, but made enough money that a full season has been ordered.

Post-Apocalypse meets Lost is how I heard it billed. Basically, an ensemble cast are tossed together in the parking basement of a hotel when something happens. We are not sure what; we just see the chaos outside the building. Cell phones are flaky, TV is showing weird happenings, but along with the trapped bunch in the basement, we are mostly in the dark. Oooooo, cue mysterious tense music.

The opening act gives us french actress Louise Monot as Gigi, as an actress in LA trying to get a good role but offered a bad one. She is our eyes into what happens around the city, as the cast gets tossed together, trapped in the basement. Tense moments, conflicts, allegiances and essentially an entire season mingled into act two.

When they finally escape, they are given a bit of deus ex machina by escaping to The Rich Lady's house. Therein lies food, booze and rest. It would have been a perfect place to hole up for a few episodes while the series lays out the groundwork for the season, but nope, bad guys show up and everyone has to run off into the dark, into the woods. Are there woods in LA? End act three.

It has possibilities, as it flowed back and forth across the line of decent indie production to half-assed web series. It was definitely not a polished Netflix original series (not sure how they knew how to produce such quality as the first of its kind) but it has potential. I have a feeling the cast will be gutted before the series properly starts but even so, there could be some fun to be had.

And then we have Crisis, which I just noticed is running on broadcast TV now.  It was a mid-season replacement series from NBC, which I am pretty sure we saw long before it properly aired, but it has all the feeling of half-assed web series. The charm of web series is that despite their clunkiness and limited budgets, they are often labours of love and that shows through. Their condensed formats, usually running much less than 42 minutes of standard TV, keep things flowing and create a whole new rhythm. This one has all the bad acting, head shaking story telling and boring sets without any of the charm. It was really bottom of the barrel scraping for mid-season replacing.

Basically the plot is that a bunch of kids, including the President's son, are kidnapped by an extreme group, one of whom we find out is actually one of the kidnapped, a disgruntled intelligence worker played by Dermot Mulroney in scary-geek mode. So, its up to the Secret Service (who had traitors in their midst) and FBI (when did late-20s blonde become an FBI model?) and the kids themselves to save everyone. But I am not sure we actually care about these over-privileged kids and their desperate parents. I am sure someone billed it as 24 for soccer moms,  but again, not my demo.

Its kind of disappointing that soon after the emergence of exploring TV from different sources, I am already running out of decent stuff to watch. I guess I should just give up for a while and watch the three Bridges.

Bad Movie: Werewolf: The Beast Among Us

2012, Louis Morneau -- download

Aaargh, I don't know why I like them, I just do.  You know, those bad straight-to-DVD (for as long as the term has a lifespan) genre movies produced purely for the world multi-market distribution system. Someone, somewhere is willing to pump money into a movie (but only so much money) knowing they will make it back via the various avenues where people don't always full consider what they are getting themselves into, such as the inflight movie or hotel chain pay-for-view.  And of course, there is the genre cable station who doesn't like to spend much on movies.  Much to the chagrin of movie snobs everywhere the flick have been made for as long as there was a "straight to ..." market and will continue.

My usual fare is the Disaster or Science Gone Wrong flick. Throw a meteor at the earth, crack the core in two or develop a weather tracking system that actually freezes New York under a glacier and I am tempted.  Considering the blockbuster versions of these movies are usually not very well made, how much worse can the mockbuster (sub-genre of what I am talking about) be ?  Much much worse is the answer. I am less tolerant of other genres, such as slasher horror or even swords & sorcery (look! a movie starring LARPers!) but every so often something about the plot (?!?) attracts me.

This one?  It was the idea of a motley crue of werewolf hunters that brought me in.  The grizzled leader in the duster & wide-brimmed hat, the steampunk woman with a flame thrower, the guy pretending to be Dracula and that guy and that other guy !  Ensemble casts are the in-thing now.  They are the skilled hunters of the supernatural but unfortunately, we never actually see their skill as they fail to capture or kill the beast.  Seriously, we don't even get a preamble where we are presented with their accomplishments.  Unless you count the drunken tale of how his horse ended up with only two legs.

Apparently, this movie was originally slotted to be a follow-up to the Benicio del Toro The Wolfman, where Universal was rebooting its classic monster stable.  This really cannot be seen as a followup or even mockbuster of anything, unless you count Van Helsing, because the heros both wear floppy hats and leather dusters.  It's just a boring, low budget vehicle for a European (shot in Bavaria!) practical effects school (how gross can you make the corpses?) with bad acting, swiss cheese script and terrible pacing.  And that's all I can recall even though it was only a week ago.