There are a lot of werewolf movies out there. A lot of them seem to have ditched the 'creepy village' plot element, which is a real shame. This one didn't. In fact, I'd say 'creepy village' is pretty much a major player in this story line. It's got everything. Gypsy curses, army of werewolves, human sacrifice, aforementioned village, and a great vibe. I mean the lighting is just incredibly atmospheric.
With so many vampire and werewolf movies coming out in the last few years, and a huge amount of them just being...bad...this one stands out. It's a genuinely entertaining story about a young man who goes back to the village he grew up in, and reconnects with an old friend and a somewhat evil uncle. A 100 years ago, a gypsy placed a curse on his family and the village, that on the anniversary of a terrible crime committed by one of his family members, someone of his bloodline would have to be sacrificed.
Obviously the poor guy doesn't know this, because it would have been a lot harder for anyone to persuade him to go home. Taken by surprise in the middle of the night, he's trapped in a cellar with the werewolf, along with his publisher who made a surprise visit that same day. An old friend manages to help them escape, which sadly unleashes yet another curse on the village, much worse than the first.
The same man who helped our hero escape is forced to go back to the cellar the next day, to find out if the werewolf is still there. What he finds is...a child. Yes, the werewolf was a child cursed to become a beast every night for a hundred years...
So he sneaks the kid back to his place, and they decide there might be another way to end the curse. Cut off the main guy's pinky and feed it to the kid.
He's not too terribly receptive to the idea, but as they say...any port in a storm, right?
This is a clever little film. It's not the end-all be-all of werewolf cinema, but it's great if you're just in the mood for a good movie. An excellent double feature with Dog Soldiers.
No comments:
Post a Comment