Don't Clap For This Wolfman!
Carter tears his way through Leigh Whannell's new remake
"Wolfman" follows family man Blake, played by Christopher Abbott, as he packs up his wife and daughter to Oregon to sell his deceased father's farmhouse.
After being attacked by a creature on the way to the house, they find themselves in the fight of their lives as Blake starts to change into an unholy creature of the night.
Goodness Gracious, this is one of the worst werewolf movies I've ever seen. While Leigh Whannell does a great job directing the movie, his story was extremely underwhelming, as the wolf man in the title isn't actually a werewolf, but a man with what I can only describe as advanced rabies.
The story portrays the werewolf curse as a sickness or an infection rather than an actual curse which heavily disappointed me, especially when a great werewolf movie was in the ingredients, but someone knocked too much salt into the bowl, causing an undesired reaction.
The reason I'm very harsh on this movie is because Whannell's previous Universal Monster remake "The Invisible Man" changed the concepts of The Invisible Man himself, but the story was still mostly the same. The original monster was still present just in a different format.
This movie, on the other hand, has zero connections to the actual wolfman, and I feel this wasn't supposed to be. They probably slapped the title of "Wolfman" just to gain more traction but ultimately failed at capturing the audience, including me.
I will say, the acting is serviceable but Christopher Abbott wasn't granted the chance to fully "wolf out," in my opinion. I really like Julia Garner who plays Charlotte, the wife of Blake, and I think she did a good job. Matilda Firth who played the young daughter, Ginger, was also good. I thought they had solid performances.
Overall I'd say avoid this movie like the plague as I don't think it's worth the time and money to rent. It lands at a 5/10 on my scale, and I hope Whannell learns his lesson from this train-wreck of an experiment.
Reviewer Carter Salley is a junior majoring in Media Arts. He is the co-host of Central Michigan Life's pop culture podcast "Raving Geeks."
