The Wolfman (2010)

When it comes to good old campy popcorn action films two of my favorites are revivals of classic horror characters in The Mummy and Van Helsing, but can The Wolfman truly equate to the entertainment value of those two action gems?

The well cast Benicio Del Toro is Lawrence Talbot, an actor in America who is contacted by his soon to be sister-in-law Gwen Conliffe (Emily Blunt) regarding the recent disappearance of his brother.  She earnestly requests that he return home to England to help in the search for him.  He hadn't been home since he was a young boy, having been committed to a mental institution for a year after finding his mother dead and claiming his father (Anthony Hopkins) was responsible.  Following that he was shipped off to America to live with his Aunt.  Upon the correspondence from Gwen he quickly returns home only to discover that the body of his brother has been found ripped to shreds.

Lawrence vows to Gwen that he will remain until he's found the person responsible for his brother's death, though he quickly learns the person responsible may not be a man, but a beast.  Upon going to speak to the local gypsies, who had dealt with his brother often, Lawrence is caught in the middle of a werewolf attack and is bitten by the beast.  Now seemingly cursed to forever turn into a werewolf during a full moon Lawrence begins to discover how this curse closely intertwines with his family's past.

The character of the Wolfman hasn't had a legitimate film role for over twenty years, and hasn't had a successful one since it's film birth in the 1940's with the original Wolfman, Lon Chaney Jr.  The 1940's were essentially the golden era of horror films, where characters such as Dracula, Frankenstein's Monster and the Wolfman saw their rise to fame, only the Wolfman seems to have been the lone ugly ducking of the family and never saw as much fame after the Lon Chaney Jr. run, where the other major characters managed to find numerous success in the hands of other actors.  With Hollywood's ever growing obsession of reviving, rebooting and remaking classic series, the resurrection of the original Wolfman was simply a matter of time, but was it worth it?

With an all-star cast The Wolfman at least has the possible makings of a good horror revival.  Del Toro was an excellent selection for the lead role simply because he looks like a Wolfman without the makeup.  Throw in Anthony Hopkins as Lawrence's disturbed father, Emily Blunt and his love interest and Hugo Weaving as the inspector sent to investigate the string of bizarre murders, and The Wolfman has promise.  Also worth complementing is the film's sense of style as the costumes and the overall atmosphere really sticks to the period and look of the classic horror films from where this character was born.

Where The Wolfman begins to falter is the action sequences and the mediocre storyline.  The action sequences are a little sloppy and simply turn into a competition of how many severed arms and heads can the beast rip off.  Thankfully the people behind the beast opted out of the complete CGI fad, that most filmmakers turn to, and the Wolfman looks more realistic because it is essentially a person made up.  The only downside to this is the character is less scary and at times a little more campy, but at least it sticks to some of the traditions of the originals.  

In terms of the story I don't honestly know if anything could have been done to improve upon it, this seems to be a major hindrance with the character itself, and probably a good reason why the Wolfman hasn't received as much attention as some of the genre's other classic characters.  How do you make the Wolfman more interesting?  And how far can this character ultimately progress?  It also doesn't help matters when the cast is full of talented actors, usually great actors and mediocre scripts only lead the magnification of the story's flaws.  I actually believe had the cast not been made up of such talented well known actors the film as a whole would have probably turned out better simply because over acting is less likely to occur.  Overall, I think The Wolfman is about the best modern revival this character will ever receive simply because he's limited in terms of his ability to expand as a character.  You can move the Wolfman to various settings but there's ultimately no easy way to expand the character to make him anymore interesting.  Therefore this film does the character justice, it's simply not my favorite revival.

6/10