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Wolf Man review: a terrifying tragedy

Wolf Man, releasing 16 January, is a terrifying revival of the classic monster flick.
(from left) Charlotte (Julia Garner), Ginger (Matilda Firth) and Blake (Christopher Abbott) in Wolf Man, directed by Leigh Whannell. Image: Universal Studios

Consider the werewolf: a half-person, half-beast, prone to irrepressible body-breaking changes that render them a threat to society as we know it – and thus condemn them to life as an outcast.

With that in mind, it makes sense that when facing the socially isolating Covid lockdowns – and a subsequent disappointing response to his previous outing (Invisible Man), Leigh Whannell and his partner in life and film, Corbett Tuck, turned to thoughts of the lonely lycanthrope.

Together, they decided to tackle a remake of 1941’s The Wolf Man. In their version, a married couple and their daughter seek respite from their fraying relationship and workaholism by temporarily moving to the country – but what awaits them there is a nightmare that would prefer they never left.

Wolf Man is the latest horror flick from Australian director Whannell (who is perhaps best known for being one of the creators of the Saw franchise), co-written with his wife during a time of sickness and uncertainty, as Whannell and Tuck worried about how this epidemic would affect them and their young children. More than a cathartic exercise, the resulting work is a terrifying – and relatable – fable that revives the classic Universal monster picture for the modern era.

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Wolf Man on the loose

The opening shot of a fly being voraciously consumed by ants, complete with head-throbbing foley work, sets a deeply uncomfortable tone for things to come. We are introduced to the then pre-pubescent Blake as he ventures out on a routine hunt with his militaristic father.

Shot in New Zealand, the naturally stunning mountain views (standing in here for rural Oregon) act as a contrasting reprieve to the dense, suspicious forest. The simple act of walking into a forest in this film immediately fills the audience with tension: most of us are familiar with the source material, thus we all know that’s the perfect place for the horrors to occur. Stay out of the woods!

Some clunky dialogue aside, this flashback sequence does a decent job at setting up the primary point of distinction between this Wolf Man and the wolf men before it: this is about inherited trauma – the kind that arises when overly-strict methods of preventing trauma in children are instead the very things that causes it.

We also get treated to the film’s first couple of jump scares, each of them employing tried-and-true methods of spookiness to illicit a few yelps from movie-goers: a dark figure seen only through binoculars is one such familiar device (but all the same, I jumped a mile).

We fast-forward 30 years via expository title-card. The adult Blake, now played by Christopher Abbott (Sanctuary, Poor Things), is a loving father to his little girl Ginger, but his marriage to journalist wife Charlotte (Ozark‘s Julia Garner) is on the rocks.

There’s nothing revelatory here: it’s simply a quick narrative device to get them to the next point: a visit to Blake’s childhood home that he believes will give them the fresh mindset they need to keep their family together. After all, what’s more delightful than a rickety old cabin in the woods, with no phone reception and not another soul to be seen for miles? This will surely ensure Ginger grows up with no mental scarring whatsoever!

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As they arrive at the farmhouse in the dead of night, they’re attacked by an unseen ‘animal’. Blake is injured, and (in a very Jurassic Park-inspired fashion) the three of them barely manage to escape their truck before finding the house and locking themselves in for the night.

No surprises there, but that’s not the point. Whannell is far more interested with the terror of being locked into a narrative ride that you know is going to terrifying places but nonetheless can’t be stopped. The bad shit is going to happen, whether you like it or not.

Hungry eyes

The remainder of the film takes place during the same night, as Blake suddenly comes down with a mysterious illness, and a series of typical horror-movie obstacles prevent them all from leaving.

The best part of the film from here on in is driven by the decision to switch between Blake’s perspective and Charlotte’s. From her perspective, her husband is becoming increasingly ill to the point of delirium. But from his perspective, the entire world is changing: from full colour to muted monochrome laced with neon blues and reds, complete with a warped soundscape that comes as a result of enhanced hearing and loss of speech recognition.

A particularly eerie moment comes from a frustrated Blake trying to locate the source of a persistent banging sound – which ends up being something no-one expects.

At the preview screening I attended in Melbourne, Whannell shared that the film was partly inspired by losing a family member to terminal illness. The parallels that both he and Tuck have drawn in their script between lycanthropy and life-altering illness are evident. The story of the Wolf Man will always be a tragic one: to be a werewolf is to be alone.

In this version, the film is carried by the tragedy of losing communication with a loved one, and watching them go to a place where you can’t follow.

Wolf Man is out in Australian cinemas from 16 January.

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3.5 out of 5 stars

Wolf Man

Actors:

Julia Garner, Christopher Abbott, Matilda Firth

Director:

Leigh Whannell

Format: Movie

Country: USA

Release: 16 January 2025

Silvi Vann-Wall is a journalist, podcaster, and filmmaker. They joined ScreenHub as Film Content Lead in 2022. Twitter: @SilviReports