Bypassing a theatrical release and heading straight for the retail market in time for slashing the cash jugular over the Halloween season Werewolf: The Beast Among Us comes bearing fangs and an abundance of fur but will it be lost in a genre market that has long since given up on full moon thrills leaning more towards the current saturated demand for the undead? Hopefully not: yes it’s daft, yes it’s not exactly high-brow but it’s cheerful, moves at a decent pace and is not shy of splashing out on the gore.
A 19th century village is being terrorized by a mysterious and savage beast by moonlight. As luck would have it a bunch of werewolf hunters have heard about this and popped into town offering to take care of their carnivorous problem. For young doctor’s apprentice Daniel (Guy Wilson) it’s not enough to sit back and let the hunters take care of business. He wants to assist them in saving his village and loved ones from becoming bloodied corpses for his doctor pal (Stephen Rea) to heavily sigh over.
Werewolf: The Beast Among Us is abundant in gore and the odd visual effect isn’t too shoddy either. Whether as homage or a blatant steal the writers have the Clint Eastwood-styled lead of the hunters, Charles (Ed Quinn), address the townsfolk at a meeting to talk about destroying their hirsute savage saying that he will catch and kill the beast but not for the money they’re offering before asking them to consider a much larger amount.
Little short of dragging his fingers down a blackboard to draw their attention and going by the name of Quint is a scene cribbed wholesale from the classic Jaws and there’s even a line that nods to ‘You’re gonna need a bigger boat’ too. It’s shameless but adds to the charm. And as with the shark in Jaws this isn’t just some standard werewolf we’re dealing with here but one vastly bigger than most too.
In-between the blood letting you’ll find yourself asking how it is such a small village – it appears small in the film – manages to have so many torn-up bodies but without anyone locally managing to pull a gun and shoot the beast as it munches through so many right under their very noses. And given that the beast’s agenda is to rid their village of the trashier elements does the beast stop short of killing some of them only for them to start to turn – during the day – and for Rea’s doctor to shoot them anyway – by the way there’s some nice exploding heads in Werewolf.
There are also dubious character revelations in the third act that just swamp everything down and it didn’t help during a key point in the movie – where Charles finally susses who the werewolf is – that the Property of Universal Pictures lettering pings up across on the screener and dampens the reveal.
There are moments in Werewolf that are unintentionally laugh-out loud funny. There’s the girlfriend of Daniel who thinks nothing of her loved-one getting shot at by her father, smirking as she watches from the doorway, but falls apart at the prospect of him hunting a werewolf because, you know, he may get killed. HE GETS SHOT AT BY YOUR DAD AND NOW YOU’RE CONCERNED ABOUT HIS WELL-BEING!!!! Go figure!
Scarface’s Steven Bauer, as werewolf hunter Hyde, is initially unrecognisable under his eye patch, and really doesn’t have much to do except for be useful in the press blurb – having the film Scarface on your CV does wonders for marketability. As for Stephen Rea, the other ‘name’ in the cast, he’s not exactly new to this werewolf malarkey after transforming into one for Neil Jordan’s haunting and superior A Company of Wolves. Here has little to do except provide some audience recognition, roll his eyes occasionally and pick up the pay cheque. Elsewhere the Alum Cumming wannabe Adam Croasdell irritates as Stefan and Guy Wilson surprises in the lead.
Director Louis Morneau has finally made a film of which he can be proud, after the risible Bats and The Hitcher II: I’ve Been Waiting, in that it does exactly what you expect of a direct-to-DVD offering. It’s daft, fast and perfect for a disposable ninety minutes of colourful, dumb fun and after the straight-laced fare that normally passes for lycanthrope flicks (the recent The Wolfman stand up please) it’s nice to see our furry friends can play well and don’t just have a shelf-life dependant on the Twilight franchise.