I love horror movies. My wife doesn't. BUT she does enjoy a good werewolf movie. Over the month we have tried a few with varying degrees of success. I thought I'd switch it up tonight with a few werewolf movies.
This one was out first one and I liked how it looked and started. I was written, directed, and starred Jim Cummings. Normally I avoid movies where one guy wears all the hats, the notable exception is Spike Lee. But this one did not feel like an ego trip (looking at you M. Night Shyamalan). It also featured Riki Lindholm, which is always a plus in my book.
So this sleepy little town in Utah, which barely sees any sort of crime, is suddenly beset upon by a bunch of grisly murders that are soon blamed on a werewolf. Only the Sheriff (Cummings) doesn't believe. We see many of the victims get torn apart from the point of view of the werewolf and even see bits of the creature.
The movie is a bit slow, but the cast is likable. In particular, Robert Forster plays the older Sheriff Hadley and Cummings father in this. It would be his last role before he died. In fact we would later comment that some of the other sheriffs we see later on, seemed to be modeled on the whole Robert Forster vibe.
In the end it is not a werewolf, but a serial killer dressed up in a wolf pelt with homemade claws.
This is one of those horror movies where the director and writer know that horror fans are watching, so they set up some deliberate tropes to knock them down. In this one six highschool or college (never really clear) are given the assignment to re-write some local history.
It was set in 1986, which I can only assume they wanted to avoid things like the Internet or cell phones to tell their story. A cell phone would have come in handy and a quick internet search would have likely saved some lives. But I digress.
The six students, three boys, three girls, very convenient, head out to the woods to get more details on the legend of Emily Burt, the Talbot County werewolf. In the process they manage to get themselves lost and killed in no time.
In some trope defying moves, there is no sex and no nudity from our main cast members. There is also no werewolf or ghost werewolf. The killer is again (or before) just someone with a weird wolf claw-thing. The killer though is Isabella, one of the girls on the camping trip. Turns out she is crazy and so is her caretaker. Isabella is the daughter of Emily Burt.
Everyone dies, EXCEPT for the jock. So a change there.
Finally! A real werewolf. It also answers the question "is lycanthropy sexually transmitted?" No, but it can be inherited.
We did not realize this was part of an anthology but it does work as a stand-alone movie.
Esme and Luna move to a new town where Esme pays for everything in cash and keeps Luna close to home. Especially on the full moon. Luna is a 10-year-old werewolf. We get the idea from flashbacks that Luna's father and Esem were together for a bit, even to the point where they got married. But something happened to Luna's dad and the impression is he got out and Esme had to kill him.
Esme moves from town to town and avoids any personal contact when she can. It doesn't help that local sheriff, NOT played by Robert Forster though he tries, takes a quick dislike to Esme.
Through some events Sam the local bartender takes a liking to Esme and shows up at her place one day. He comes into the house and smells the meat she leaves out for Luca when he is a werewolf. Sam freaks out, she freaks out and accidentally knocks him down the stairs and kills him. She locks Luna in his cage and goes to get rid of Sam's truck. Not soon after the sheriff shows up looking for Sam, finds his dead body in a cage with Luna and the full moon is rising.
Well, you can figure the rest out from here.
Not a bad flick, but really didn't scratch that werewolf itch we have. Still, better than rapey aliens and rapey fishmen.
October 2021
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