Sam Jaeger Archives - Sean Kelly On Movies

A man undergoes horrifying changes after he and his family are attacked by a creature near their remote Oregon farm in Wolf Man. Blake Lovell (Christopher Abbott) is a San Francisco man, who receives word that his long-missing father Grady (Sam Jaeger) has been declared dead. Blake convinces his wife Charlotte (Julia Garner) to join him and their daughter Ginger (Matilda Firth) in visiting Grady's farm in Oregon. Ho On the way, Blake crashes his truck when a creature appears in the middle of the road. While attempting to escape, the creature injures Blake in the arm. The family makes it to Grady's farmhouse to hide out for the night; however, Blake undergoes some horrifying changes. Wolf Man Synopsis Wolf Man is the latest Universal Monsters reboot from Blumhouse, co-written and directed by Leigh Whannell (Insidious, Upgrade, The Invisible Man). The film is arriving fifteen years after the previous 2010 iteration of The Wolfman, which was directed by Joe Johnston and starred Benicio Del Toro, Anthony Hopkins, and Emily Blunt. This new film largely ignores the premise of 1941's The Wolf Man and instead reimagines lycanthropy as the symptoms of a disease called "hills fever," nicknamed "Face of the Wolf." Christopher Abbott (Possessor, Sanctuary, Poor Things) stars as Blake Lovell, who long ago moved away from his father Grady, who the opening prologue establishes was obsessed with tracking down the "Face of the Wolf." Grady went missing in his search and has finally been declared dead. Blake convinces his overworked wife Charlotte, played by Julia Garner (We Are What We Are, The Assistant, The Royal Hotel), to come to Grady's farm with their young daughter Ginger, who has a closer relationship with Blake than Charlotte. However, when Blake is injured and slowly begins turning into a werewolf, it is up to Charlotte to protect her family. My Thoughts on Wolf Man Five years after reimagining The Invisible Man as an allegory for gaslighting and domestic abuse, Leigh Whannell aimed for a similar deconstruction of the werewolf mythos with Wolf Man. Whannell was reportedly more inspired by David Cronenberg's The Fly when it comes to his depiction of lycanthropy as a horrible disease. Indeed, Wolf Man goes in a very body horror direction, as Blake undergoes his changes, which begin with heightened senses and soon become more grotesque. If given time to properly develop, Leigh Whannell's concept for Wolf Man had major promise. However, in execution, Blake's transformation in Wolf Man comes as incredibly rushed, with the bulk of the plot of the film taking place throughout a single night. We are not given real time to process the changes that are happening to Blake, who has to remain a sympathetic figure throughout his transformation, as there is another werewolf tormenting the family during this time. Wolf Man also suffers from being an incredibly low-lit film. While this is likely a purposeful decision by Leigh Whannell and cinematographer Stefan Duscio, which includes a moment of "werewolf can see people, while people can't see werewolf," it is likely done more to hide the limitations of the practical werewolf effects. Speaking of which, Leigh Whannell most definitely strays from the traditional werewolf appearance in Wolf Man, even though the make-up does contain elements similar to Lon Chaney's appearance from the 1941 film. Ultimately, Wolf Man is the result of trying to fix something that was not broken. Believing himself unable to match Rick Baker's Oscar-winning effects in both An American Werewolf in London and 2010's The Wolfman, Leigh Whannell decided to focus less on the transformation and more on the physical and mental changes. There comes a point in Wolf Man, where Blake changes so much that he can no longer understand human language and he begins viewing people in a bluish hue. However, even Whannell's main inspiration The Fly took some time with the changes that were happening, instead of rushing the transformation in a single night. I don't know if the issues with Wolf Man come from the script Leigh Whannell wrote with Corbett Tuck or if producer Jason Blum's usual low budgets ended up being a hindrance for the film. I don't even want to get into illogical casting decisions such as casting 30-year-old Julia Garner as the mother of a 10-year-old. Ultimately, Wolf Man is a much weaker Universal Monsters reimagining than The Invisible Man and perhaps it is better to just leave the classics alone.

Sam Jaeger

Wolf Man

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