PLOT: A man (Christopher Abbott) is scratched by a mysterious monster while defending his family. Soon, he begins to transform, endangering the people he was trying to protect.
REVIEW: Wolf Man is co-writer/ director Leigh Whannell’s attempt to ground yet another of the classic Universal Monsters following his hit The Invisible Man. Like that movie, it works more-or-less as its own thing, separate from any established lore. While The Invisible Man was basically an elevated stalker thriller, Wolf Man is an attempt to take on body horror with heavy doses of family drama baked in. The result is a decent-enough thriller that lacks the thrills one might expect from a werewolf movie, opting for atmosphere and emotion instead. While it sports a terrific performance from star Christopher Abbott, it also totally lacks scares, making it a movie that might alienate horror fans hoping for something a little more edge-of-your-seat than what Whannel delivers.
It has to be said that the director does seem less interested in making a horror film than a drama exploring the deeper theme of generational trauma. As the movie begins, we see Abbott’s character, Blake, as a child, being raised by his survivalist father, Grady (Sam Jaeger), whose intensity and demands for obedience leave Blake estranged from him as an adult. When he finds out his father has died, he takes his family, including his workaholic wife, Charlotte (Julia Garner) and adoring daughter, Ginger (Matilda Firth), to pack up his secluded home in Colorado. Of course, once there, they are attacked by a wolf that seems to stand on two feet and infects Blake.
Now, it should be said that Whannell dispenses with pretty much all the lore you’d expect from a werewolf movie, meaning no full moons or silver bullets. The transformation also seems to be a one-and-done thing, meaning once Blake becomes a wolf, there’s no way back. That makes it feel more like a generic monster movie, as it does away with the most interesting bit of werewolf lore, being that the hero transforms back and forth and has to live with the carnage he inflicts.
Pretty much the only element this has in common with the original Universal Wolf Man is that, like Lon Chaney Jr’s Larry Talbot, Blake is exceedingly mild-mannered, with him an innocent victim of the curse who winds up being infected due to his own heroism, as he got hurt trying to protect his family. Abbott gets a solid showcase as Blake becomes more beastly, gradually losing the ability to talk, with the make-up effects used for the full werewolf much better than what we saw in early images.
Given the remote settings, the movie is almost entirely confined to one location, with Abbott, Garner and Firth the only ones on-screen for ninety percent of the running time. Garner’s role as the breadwinning mom (Blake is a stay-at-home father) of the family initially seems one-note until she gradually becomes more active as the film goes on. Yet, the heart of the movie belongs to the relationship between Blake and his daughter, who is shown to have a special bond with him from the beginning and is the only thing allowing him to hold onto some shreds of his humanity.
While it’s well-acted and shot, the fact remains that Wolf Man has one major failing – it’s simply not scary. Blake’s transformation is played for pathos and drama, and even if we know there’s another wolf around there stalking the family, the attack scenes are limited and shot so darkly that a lot of the werewolf stuff is hard to make out.
As such, Wolf Man is a notch or two below The Invisible Man, a movie that had some really memorable scares, and the terrific Upgrade. It will likely pull in a solid crowd this weekend. Still, to me it’s another disappointing Wolf Man reboot (following the big-budget Benicio del Toro film) that’s forgotten what makes that iconic monster such a classic.
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