THB #653: Wolf Man
Every great movie is a miracle.
And Leigh Whannell’s Wolf Man might make you think that God is dead.
What made this surprising was that Whannell, an actor in the Insidious series turned 4th-time feature director, had done something so unexpected and wonderful with The Invisible Man in 2020.
Jason Blum’s run as a producer is an ongoing legend, which started with Paranormal Activities and continues with the Insidious and The Purge franchises. He hit a new peak in 2016 and 2017 with the resurrection of M. Night Shyamalan as a budget-conscious money-maker on Split (then, Glass) and the presentation of Jordan Peele as a directing cash machine on Get Out.
In 2018, Blumhouse brought David Gordon Green back into the studio world with his “40 years later” take on Halloween. US matched Get Out in 2019. The in 2020, the excellent, unexpected The Invisible Man. And in 2021, the most excellent The Black Phone, which brought Scott Derrickson back to “horror” after Dr. Strange.
In 2022, it was M3GAN, then 2023 had his biggest worldwide grosser ever, Five Nights At Freddy’s.
Meanwhile, Halloween Kills was so unsatisfying that Halloween Ends was the lowest grossing of that David Gordon Green trilogy. Then Green was given The Exorcist to play with… his take on it had a $30 million budget, but more than a $100 million in rights costs associated with it… and it was bad… and it did $136 million worldwide, which was so bad against the ambitions that DGG was GONE.
And speaking of death… Wolf Man.
The character has crushed the skill set of fine directors from Mike Nichols to Joe Johnston to Mark Romanek, who exited the 2010 version a few weeks before shooting. That version also took down screenwriter Andrew Kevin Walker.
The problem seems to be that everyone who approaches the idea seems to feel that it’s just too stupid. Who cares? And how do you compete with An American Werewolf in London, which is a masterwork of the genre. (That sequel didn’t work either.)
So Whannell went with part of the Whannell formula. He hired really fine indie-minded actors, Christopher Abbott and Julia Garner, and put them in a movie neither would ever normally be expected to do… like Elizabeth Moss in The Invisible Man.
And I am betting that the script - and probably a cut of the movie - actually made sense when they signed on.
Wolf Man clocks in a 1:43, but my guess is that there has to be a 2 hour 15 minute version out there that actually explores the ideas that never get any lift in this film. And I mean NEVER.
I can’t spoil it because nothing ever pays off. So, I will explain that the movie is about kid who was raised by a single father in the middle of the Oregon woods who was in the military and is overly strict and a bit of a survivalist. The legend of a Wolf Man (or at lease, a Wolf Faced Man) exists and after a really poorly conceived sequence in which there is almost a confrontation, he leaves the kid at home and goes after Wolf Face and never comes home.
CUT TO: 25 years later. The boy is now a man and lives in a city with his prepubescent daughter and wife. But the marriage isn’t going well. Lots of slow pained looked and slow pained dialogue seeking to feel real without ever really saying anything.
So naturally, they take a road trip to clear out his dead father’s Oregon house because a long drive on windy roads when you are your wife are not communicating well is always a delight.
I can’t say for sure, as I didn’t look at my watch, but this seems to take a full third of the film, if not more. And while it isn’t dentist painful, it is duller than a 5-hour preshow before a bad boxing match.
My theory is that this agony continues over the next 2 acts (not sure there is really a 3rd act here), but that they cut it as much as they could so audiences wouldn’t hang themselves like the seatmate getting too long a story in Airplane.
Instead, we get all action… but the problem is, all that emotion doesn’t get any payout. And the action is all this weirdly unclear blur of werewolf cliches.
One of the major gags - I won’t spoil it - requires a very specific set-up that I swear to you, I do not think is actually in the film. And then, when it has its moment, there is a topper… that would be clever if it had any ongoing significance in the storytelling at all.
There is even Wolf-o-Vision™, which is not only sporadic and horribly without any storytelling rules, but it undermines one of the themes (gag… not deserving that much in this case) that seems to be meant to pay off near the end of the film.
There are moments in the film, that if cut into a 10 second clip, would be impressive. But the problem is, we seem to know how movies tell stories better than the filmmaker here… which is not true… he is not a horrible director, current evidence aside. But oh my gosh, could this thing be any more of a mess?
This is basically a 5-character movie. And 1 of the 5 characters, who is connected to the others in a real way, lasts a few minutes and then disappears and never returns. I any way. In a movie where there is a supernatural element. But it’s not like we miss him because in his brief time, he is a cipher and not very interesting... so there is not even a gasp at his exit. In a movie with 20 characters, they come and they go. But here, there are so few characters that each one seems to matter… until they don’t. Why even go there?
I really wanted to like everyone in this. I really like the 2 actors I know. I liked the young actress who plays the daughter.
And it was clear that Whannell wanted to make a “different kind of werewolf movie.”
But unlike The Invisible Man, which has a clear idea of combining The Invisible Man and Gaslight and then using modern tech cleverly, surprising at every turn, there seems to be no idea at all. And I am sure there was one. But the evidence has been buried somewhere.
In a weird way, Wolf Man seems to have the kind of complex ambition that Nosferatu has… but with none of the execution. It’s kind of the anti-Nosferatu.
What does the Wolf Man want… whichever Wolf Man in this film that we are considering. We know exactly what Nosferatu is there for. He barely says anything else. “3 nights.” So simple. So clean. This wolf is just so in his feelings that he can’t express himself clearly in any way… which is probably why his wife is done with him.
But it’s not a divorce movie. It’s not a feminist movie. It’s not a misunderstood man movie (“NightMaleDog”). It’s not about fatherhood… even if it thinks it is at times. It’s not about childhood. It’s not about anything.
And I sure don’t think its a moneygrab. Somewhere in this project’s youth or childhood, it must have said something good. Nothing comes from nothing. Nothing ever could. So somewhere in its writing and development helldom, it must have been something good.
I see failed movies all the time. It is hard to make a good movie or a really good movie or a great movie. But this one perplexed me in a way that was really singular. And if there isn’t a much longer cut that made sense but bored executives, I will be even more perplexed… because it doesn’t make sense. It’s no “A+B = Q” not making sense. The movie just keeps setting up ideas, so many ideas, and then leaves them there like a marlin on the deck of a boat that you have no plan to keep, but won’t throw back overboard… gasping for breath… trying to live… flopping like hell…
If there is a director’s cut, I’d like to see it. Because what I saw… painful on the verge of cruel. I mean, I get to leave the theater. My seat was free. They gave me popcorn and a soda. I will survive. But I hurt for the movie and the filmmaker. I could not make out their sign language no matter how hard I tried… and it was begging to be understood.
All I can hope for now is that Soderbergh’s Presence will get this taste out of my mouth.
Until tomorrow…
I saw the trailer for this in front of “Nosferatu.” I was not exactly whelmed
You were so animated talking about this movie on your podcast I knew you would end up writing a review. Its badness got your creative juices flowing.