Description
Leigh Whannell impressed critics and audiences with his masterpiece 2020 film The Invisible Man, a successful reinterpretation of the classic Universal Monsters character. Five years later, he returned with The Wolfman, an attempt at a similarly well-told tale, one that returns this classic movie monster to its original roots. Unfortunately, Whannell and his team couldn't figure out how to develop this story, producing a middling film that feels completely lifeless and is almost obsessively subdued on every level, from poor lighting to subdued voice acting. The characters lack depth due to a lack of emotional expression. The Wolfman is one of those films that sits between good and bad, not so bad that it's a waste of time, but many individual elements leave you feeling unsatisfied and almost nightmarish while watching it. It fades from memory.
Following the success of The Invisible Man, Universal was close to starting production on The Wolf Man, starring Ryan Gosling and directed by his collaborator Derek Cianfrance (Blue Valentine, The Place Beyond the Pines). We don't know what that version was like, but Cianfrance's focus on male roles and fatherhood is clear in the film, which begins with a father (Sam Yeager) walking through the woods with his son, Blake Yeager, and conveys his theory about the dangers of the world. After a nicely shot encounter with what appears to be a human in a tree, "The Wolfman" jumps decades into the future to introduce a grown-up Blake (Christopher Abbott). Blake is now on his way back to Earth, where he banished them from his father's cabin after his estranged father was declared dead.
Blake is a writer and a house husband to the attractive Ginger (Matilda Firth), but of course he has some problems in his marriage to his wife, Charlotte (Julia Garner). Charlotte's incredibly bad character details include her visiting her family and seeming happier with her coworkers than with her husband. One of the most significant flaws in Whannell and Tuck's script is how surprisingly little it offers actors in terms of roles. I have nothing against brutally efficient narratives that prioritize story over character, but it's disappointing to see an actor as talented as Garner so clearly confused, no longer sure what or even who she's playing. Continue reading at HuraWatch.