WARNING: This will include spoilers! Be warned!
Curse of the American Werewolf of London
By Ryan Bijan Jeri, 09/10/2010
After a troubled production taking almost three long years to get off the ground, Universal’s much anticipated remake of
The Wolfman will finally be hitting theaters February 12th. I was fortunate enough to see an early screening of the film a few days earlier, and as a longtime fan of the character and all of the classic Universal Monsters in general, I had to share my thoughts.
The film opens with a color-drained variation of the current Universal logo (why couldn’t they have used one of the vintage logos from the 30’s or 40’s? It would have been so much cooler and more appropriate!) and after some more production logos, segues into a title and voiceover of Maleva (Geraldine Chaplin) reciting a variation on everyone’s favorite lycanthropic poem (which is very much tacked on. More on that later.) Cut to Blackmoor England, 1891. An armed man seeks to confront some legendary beast in the woods, and as in traditional horror movie fashion, he gets exactly what he wants. Later, it is revealed that Ben Talbot, son of the eccentric Sir John has been missing. In this dark time, Ben’s fiancée Gwen Conliffe takes it upon her self to notify his long -missing brother Lawrence. While in England, American stage-star Lawrence Talbot gets her letter and returns to his home in Blackmoor to investigate his brother’s disappearance. Talbot is a brooding, wary man with a haunted background who returns not only to find his brother, but to come to terms with his tragic past.
The stage is set for a brutal reimagining of one of the most tragic horror stories of all time. Long story short:
Ben was torn apart, Larry gets bitten by the thing that did it, turns into a beast himself, goes on a few bloody rampages across Blackmoor and London, falls in love with Gwen, defeats his maker in a fiery showdown, and is hunted by an angry mob, ending in classic Universal style, leaving it open for possible sequels.
Now time for the actual review: The film is beautifully produced, and photographed by Shelly Johnson with desaturated colors hearkening back to the similar look of
Sleepy Hollow rather than the more lush, vibrant palette found in Bram Stoker’s Dracula. With the actual production designed by
Sleepy Hollow veteran Rick Heinricks, and the screenplay co-written by that film’s Andrew Kevin Walker, the general audience will be subconsciously reminded of that last great, gothic chiller. The Talbot Hall and London sets are grand, and recall the darker corners of the Victorian age without being too stylized, while the slightly fantastical outdoor forest sets directly reminded me of the haunting stage visuals found in the old school Universal backlot. Think the leafless woods from
Bride of Frankenstein meets the foggy environs of Llanwelly from the original
Wolf Man on a larger, more epic scale.
Despite certainly looking the part of the perpetually sad Lawrence Talbot, with a face reminiscent of Lon Chaney Jr (and a haircut and wardrobe recalling Oliver Reed) Benicio Del Toro’s performance ends up kind of flat. While he certainly does a terrific job doing what the script dictates, not enough time is given to develop the character in the sense that we like him for who he is. Sure, we sympathize with the brooding Larry, as the script understandably has him depressed from the beginning, and we want him to pull through from his horrible affliction, but he can never seem to generate any of the warmth and likeability that Chaney did in his five-film run, despite the character getting progressively more hopeless and gloomy.
However as the title character, Del Toro goes all out.
This Wolfman is brutal, scary and doesn’t +*$+ around. While not quite the fluffy-headed, neatly dressed icon we all know and love from the original, Rick Baker’s masterful make-up is still faithful enough to legendary monster-maker Jack Pierce’s classic design (despite making him bulkier and little more wild.) It is truly a testament to Pierce, that a character he designed almost seventy years ago can still be horrifying (with a few tweaks) to modern audiences! Even when the Wolfman was tearing up extras and shredding them up in the goriest ways possible, it was seeing that classic face doing it that nearly brought a tear of joy to this fan’s eye!
As for the rest of the cast... how can you not like Anthony Hopkins in anything? The man’s played Van Helsing, Hannibal Lecter and even Zorro! That being said, nobody plays a kooky, twisted old man like Hopkins, a role he plays here deliciously. If another actor was cast in the role, I don’t think the film would have been as good as it turned out. Emily Blunt is attractive and plays the damsel as well as anyone, and Geraldine Chaplin is memorable, despite being grossly underused as Maleva. Of course the third great player in the story is Hugo Weaving as Inspector Aberline. While not as show-stealing as Hopkins, he certainly gives Del Toro a run for his money in the charisma department as the inquisitive detective. The rest of the supporting cast was nothing short of terrific, especially the Blackmoor villagers and gypsies (the tavern scenes were right out of a James Whale film or a Hammer flick, and the extras could be right out of their stock-company! Even the bar-maid sorta reminded me of Una O‘Connor…)
I must admit the film sort of fails in the character development department,
shifting the original’s tragic drama of Man vs. Self, to a more dumbed-down Man vs. Beast (aka Dad) conflict. I do admit, though obvious from the trailers, it was a good twist to spice things up from the original, but I do wish more time was given to flesh out Talbot’s inner-suffering (“You don't understand!”) Maybe it had enough, but Del Toro just didn’t embody it like Chaney. However, the climactic werewolf showdown was a bit much, and while expected from the beginning, it was the only part I found kind of cheesy or silly (especially the Bad Wolf’s demise, which is still burned in my mind!) The fight scene reminded me of something out of Planet of the Apes, with the werewolves looking more like two of Disney’s Beasts throwing themselves at each other. Another problem I had with the film was the lack of Maleva. While she was prominent in a few scenes, she wasn’t given a strong presence throughout like she could have, and it seems like the filmmakers completely forgot about the “Pure in Heart” poem in the film’s actual story, so they shamelessly tacked it on the beginning.
I also have to confess that Danny Elfman’s salvaged score wasn’t as memorable as it could have been, often seeming like a riff on Kilar’s Dracula soundtrack; but it supported the film‘s gothic atmosphere nicely, when it could have been a lot worse. And though the film was filled with digitally altered skies and quick cuts, they were no where nowhere near as distracting or as poorly done as in Stephen Sommers’
Mummy franchise.
Fans of the original will be quick to point out the various nods to the original, as well as other werewolf classics, including the famous silver cane (which is unfortunately never explained) the telescope, Conliffe’s antique shop, the strapped chair, well-done transformations that often recall Baker’s work in American Werewolf in London, a showdown reminiscent of Werewolf of London, and a rooftop reign of terror right out of Curse of the Werewolf.
Overall, despite my minor nit-picks, I genuinely loved the film! While it could have been a little better, I am still grateful for what we got, instead of what it could’ve been. Finally a Universal horror film remade as an actual horror film and not a dumb action/adventure with plenty of comedy and CGI! After three-years in the making, Joe Johnston’s
The Wolfman is filled with enough atmosphere, drama, suspense, black humor and carnage to stand it proudly on the shelf next to Coppola’s
Dracula, Brannagh’s
Frankenstein and Burton’s
Sleepy Hollow as a successor to its gothic horror roots. I pray the movie does well, because the efforts of Johnston, the cast and crew and of course Baker’s terrific make-up, have finally made the classic monster scary again. Thank you!
Spoiler: 
I knew you'd quote that part!
