Wolf Man Movie Review

Leigh Whannells attempt at reinventing the wolf man mythos has great ideas on paper but empty and hollow in execution.

With his marriage fraying, Blake persuades his wife Charlotte to take a break from the city and visit his remote childhood home in rural Oregon. As they arrive at the farmhouse in the dead of night, they’re attacked by an unseen animal and barricade themselves inside the home as the creature prowls the perimeter. But as the night stretches on, Blake begins to behave strangely, transforming into something unrecognizable. Leigh Whannell attempts to reinvent the classic werewolf story like how he did with the invisible man but due to structural issues in the first act and the lack of characterization for the family makes the film feel empty and hollow.

Leigh Whannell does a good job directing this film even though his writing is sadly weak his choice to have our protagonist slowly turn into a werewolf is a brilliant idea. The choice of how he shows the wolf vision is inventive that is so cool to look at visually unfortunately Leigh does not hook you into the family and I see what he is trying to evoke which is David Cronenberg’s The Fly but the difference is that Cronenberg did such an amazing job to get you to care about Seth and Ronnie so when Seth is falling apart as brundle fly it is devasting whereas in Wolf man I sadly did not feel a thing for the family and I wanted to. Leigh does not give them enough characterization all you know is their marriage is going through a rough patch, the father has trauma from his father and that he has a great relationship with his daughter whereas Charlotte the mother does not it is so paper thin. Leighs desire to do a story of generational trauma but in not delving into how the father feels about his father, how it affected him growing up, how he didn’t want to make the same mistakes he did but all you get is a couple of lines makes the story feel hollow which is so unfortunate when in the invisible man Leigh did an incredible job making you care about Clelia and the themes of escaping an abusive relationship and stalking were so clear, layered, and rich it made the invisible man transcend genre but with Wolf Man it’s at best an ok werewolf movie which sucks.

The acting in the film is good despite the script being paper thin in characterization starting with Christopher Abbott as the father and husband of the family who slowly transforms into a werewolf does good work his acting almost can make up for the script being as weak as it is when you see from his perspective that he can’t understand his family anymore he sells the hell out of that. Julia Garner who plays his wife Charlotte who is a journalist is fine but going back to the script it does not flush her character out any more than that not giving her anything to play with as an actor their marriage is going through a rough patch I wish leigh would have gone into a little bit of why that is so we can be invested in them reconciling so when he gets bit its heartbreaking not leaving the viewer not caring and feeling nothing. The strongest relationship in the film is between Christopher Abbott and the young actress who plays his daughter is sweet and when he as a moment of being like his father the look on her face is of shock and fear that you really believe which could have been a great emotional anchor if the script was better.

The makeup of the Wolf Man in my opinion does not look that great at all which is another disappointment of the film he doesn’t ever look like a werewolf the balding look is interesting but looks so weird for the final design. The only moments of the makeup that worked is when the nails fall off on his hands where the claws come in and when you hear bones break but other than that the transformation through the film is underwhelming if not forgettable compared to films like An American Werewolf In Londen, The Howling, and Gingersnaps I was excited to see what Leigh would come up with which was not that great sadly. One positive I can say is the film is well shot it looks good and has moments of suspense the craftsmanship is here, but the writing of the film is what dooms this films potential.

Final thoughts on this version of the classic Universal monster is I was so bummed all the pieces were here to make something as great as the invisible man but sadly the execution fell flat this time which hey it happens I will still see anything Leigh Whannell does in the future I will give this film a 2 and a half out of 5.