Victoria Gardens Hoyts, 23/02/2010
Status: Behind, but you wouldn’t have it any other way, would you?
I find it easier to say intelligent, charming and witty things about a movie that engages the ole brain. When I sat down to write about The Wolfman, I had nothin’. My brain was thinking about far, far more engaging things like how long it’s been since I cleaned the bathroom.
Despite the beautifully realised sets and costumes - a real gothic sense of decaying opulence that must have cost a fortune to create- and the terrific cast, this little werewolf treads almost exactly the same path that’s been tread before (perhaps not terribly surprising since it is a remake).
I liked the transformations, and I appreciated that they used suits and makeup over computer graphics where possible, but the wolfy-suits just looked cumbersome at times, and not like creatures built for speed.
The music is so completely overblown that composer Danny Elfman (Spider-Man I and II and everything Time Burton’s ever done) must’ve taken steroids, then acid, then turned the microphones up to eleven.
It’s hard to say if the script or the direction is more to blame. The flashes of substance-less scare that are rolled out over and over just make the lack of story all the more evident. In the hands of a less capable and less compelling cast it would have been an absolute train wreck. But the cast are as great as you would expect HUGO WEAVING, BENECIO DEL TORO (Sin City), ANTHONY HOPKINS (Silence of the Lambs) and EMILY BLUNT (The Young Victoria) to be. Pity about the story.
Now, excuse me won’t you, I’ve got to go clean the bathroom.
