Wolfman Review!

So we FINALLY got the chance to go see this movie. Booked the tickets on Friday and went to see it today.

Highly atmospheric; the setting in Iver Heath, Buckinghamshire (which incidentally is right next door to Pinewood Studios) is perfect. Massive, seen-better-days mansion, lots of open heath with brooding grey skies, woods and a lake that looks icy cold. It's a popular location and I thought it looked familiar, so it probably will to some of you too. I did a bit of research and now know why.

Excellent score by Danny Elfman. Another aspect of the movie that was deja vu for me. You can hear shades of Coppola's Dracula in it. A movie which Elman also scored.

And of course, wow factor effects by the master, Rick Baker. No one does the legendary Wolfman quite like Baker. Though I have to say, I didn't think they surpassed his work on the 1981 American Werewolf in London. If they did, it was only marginally. I guess Baker really is that talented!

Good acting, although Del Toro was a bit wooden I thought. Emily Blunt was a nice change from the stereotype hand-wringing Victorian heroine. You got the impression her character had some grit to her. Anthony Hopkins was better in some scenes than others. I'm a big fan of his, so if it doesn't sound too lame, I'll excuse him by saying horror movies aren't his usual venue. A nice surprise was Hugo Weaving as Scotland Yard's Inspector Frederick Abberline. Perhaps it was unintentional, but he delivers some of his lines early on in the movie with wonderfully dry manner that make them quite funny. By the way, if you weren't already aware of it, there really was an Inspector Abberline with Scotland Yard. He figured prominently in the investigation of the Ripper murders in 1888.

I'm assuming you know it all ends in tragedy. The Wolfman is like the Titanic that way. You sit through the whole thing, knowing damn well the stupid boat is going to sink. But you're glued to the screen regardless. However, there is a wee surprise at the end of this telling of the big hairy beast.

This is one we'll definitely get for the home collection when it comes out on dvd.

A Hollow 8/10!