The Wolfman (2009)

[Achim]

The Wolfman (2009)

Saw this in the cinema and found it to be a rather mixed back (the friend I watched it with thought the entire film was utter garbage).

The story follows the original fairly loosely, with some rather liberal changes (unless I am remembering the original wrong), such as

Spoiler (hover to show)

the father also being a werewolf

. Lawrence Talbot is once again injured by another werewolf, which in turn obviouisly will make him the same. He returned home after his brother had died (turns out he was killed by a vicious creature) to help his father and the fiancee of his now-dead brother. He is institutionalized in an asylum for thinking crazy thoughts, turnign into a werewolf is just ridiculous; or is it? The professor of the asylum presents the crazy man to his colleagues on a night of a full moon...

All the main elements are there. We even get good acting from Benicio Del Toro, Hugo Weaving and others in the cast and Anthony Hopkins is there too. The special effects are up to standards and the transformation scenes look painful and ferocious. The killings are extremely violent and ferocious.

But why do we get the werewolf shown as a rabid animal, killing everyone in site, even hunting them down, without purpose, like a lunatic serial killer? I always felt a werewolf kills for food or because he's provoked, so this was just wrong to me. Then there is the highly underdeveloped love story, which should have been given more attention to more powerful at the end. Then there is the music, which painfully reminded me of Bram Stoker's Dracula more often than it should have.

[Jimmy]

Will it be a surprise if I write that even if it's a remake, even if it's a new movie and even if I usually hate them

I want to buy this movie

All the guys I usually trust since they have the same taste than me praise it...
The fact that your friend haven't like the film make it even more a must see and must buy to me. BTW Achim, originally the wolfmen were killing beasts as the real wolves are. So it's a return to the real werewolves mythologie, not the movie werewolves but the catholic religion werewolves the one you became when you don't go to the Church seven years in a row at the Easter celebration. One last thing, the werewolf in An American Werewolf in London hunt to kill and the Lon Chaney Jr. wolfman hunt to kill also.

Thanks for the review

[Achim]

Well, I mostly figured this to be a remake of the Lon Chaney Jr. film, not a re-imagining of catholic mythology...

One last thing, the werewolf in An American Werewolf in London hunt to kill and the Lon Chaney Jr. wolfman hunt to kill also.

Sure they hunt to kill, no problem with that. But what he did in this movie felt a bit overdone. Running around the gypsy camp, or London, killing one after the other without further purpose.

Talking about An American Werewolf in London, I found it interesting how closely the plots match Does that mean the John Landis film is a much closer remake of the original Wolf man film than I thought?


For what it's worth: I would never in my dream assume that my film review would have any validity with you Why my friend, who you don't really know (other than that he liked Transformers 2 better than he himself had expected) is a measure I don't understand.

[Jimmy]

Why my friend, who you don't really know (other than that he liked Transformers 2 better than he himself had expected) is a measure I don't understand.

I've take a guess that he is the average movie viewers, so if he had not liked it it's a plus for me. Of course if he isn't my guess doesn't work anymore and you can transmit my excuse to your friend for taking him for an average movie viewers.

[Jon]

Jimmy, you whore! 

Achim's is literally the only review I've read with a single good word for this. Everyone else hates the thing so far! It comes across as a completely unoriginal pointless remake that steals blatantly from other movies without a shred of originality, and worst of all, it's mainstream Hollywood pap, Jimmy! It's a recipe for exactly the sort of film you'd avoid!

So you'd sell yourself so cheap? 

 

[Achim]

I've take a guess that he is the average movie viewers, so if he had not liked it it's a plus for me. Of course if he isn't my guess doesn't work anymore and you can transmit my excuse to your friend for taking him for an average movie viewers.

Well, from where you are he might as well be an average viewer No offense taking in any shape or form, by the way. He does have a very varied taste for films, but doesn't really get into your "area". He normally likes horror films a lot, so it actually surprised me that he despised it as much as he did. His complaints were similar to mine, although, he just had no interest at all to even dig as depp as I did to find to look anything good.

Actually, at this point I am really curious about what you will think onmce you see it!

Achim's is literally the only review I've read with a single good word for this.

´
I thought I was making an effort to see the good... After all, I gave it a "3 out of 5", not worse.