Neowolf (2010)
Review by Michael Varrati
When the phrase “Directed by Alan Smithee” appears in the opening credits to a motion picture, it usually doesn’t bode well for the audience. When that movie is about a pack of werewolves masquerading as a rock band, you’ve got a surefire recipe for disaster.
Such is Neowolf, a direct-to-video number that never really rises past its own muddled aspirations.
For those unfamiliar with the Alan Smithee moniker, it might behoove us all to take a brief moment to explain why it is such a pretense of cinematic doom. Simply stated, Alan Smithee is not a real director, but rather an official pseudonym used in filmmaking circles by directors, writers, etc. to officially disown a project. This often happens due to studio interference (or some other unseen circumstance), which results in a film’s final product looking nothing like the filmmaker’s artistic vision. The Alan Smithee credit allows the director to take their name off a flick and have an out, ultimately disowning the product without ever having to take credit for its delivery. It’s like if Steven Spielberg decided to make a feature version of Fantasy Island, but the studio hacked it to look like Lost; Steve could walk away, credit the film to Smithee, and thus, no harm, no foul.
Of course, the Smithee tactic is usually the exception to the rule. Only in the most extreme circumstances can a filmmaker walk away and not take credit for their motion picture. Simply put, if you see that name, it’s bad news.
Which brings us back to the film in question, and unfortunately for Neowolf, even the most passive cult filmgoer can see why creative ties were severed.
As previously mentioned, Neowolf is a film that concerns itself with the exploits of murderous werewolves who masquerade as a touring rock band. Although the band’s constant travelling provides them with the perfect cover story for their killing sprees, the furry rockers hit a snag when they dismiss (and subsequently consume) their lead guitarist in the film’s opening scenes. Without an axe-man, the band is on the hunt for fresh meat, leading them to Tony (Michael Frascino), a local guitar hero with big dreams. Suddenly, Tony is being offered everything he has always wanted, but with bloody strings attached. As Tony slips deeper into what might ultimately become his furry prison, his girlfriend Rosemary works tirelessly to uncover the true secret of the band that has captured the mind of her one true love.
If you’re thinking the whole synopsis sounds horribly melodramatic, you’d be right on point. However, in a post-Twilight era, melodramatic werewolf movies are pretty much par for course, and while Twilight isn’t necessarily the true horror fan’s bread and butter, that lesser properties should want to ape its success should come as no surprise. However, whether you’re a fan of those sparkly vampire sensations or not, it must be made clear that Twilight succeeds where Neowolf fails, if only because the former has some sense of structure. Unfortunately for viewers of Neowolf, there is a strong suggestion that the film was stitched together by a simplistic character who couldn’t even grasp the simplest forms of narrative flow. Often slapdash in its presentation, the film asks the viewer to make phenomenally huge leaps of faith, based solely on a lack of clarity in the film’s pacing and script.
In such one scene, our main character is accepted into the band, much to the chagrin of his girlfriend. In the sequence immediately following, the girlfriend is already investigating her suspicions that the rockers are actually werewolves, despite being given zero reason to leap to such a conclusion. Although her suspicions prove well-founded (as we know), there is nothing written into the script that insinuates to the viewer such a theory would even be a logical one to have. It’s shoddy writing, providing zero explanation for why the characters behave the way they do. Worse yet is the fact that this offense is one of the less glaring examples present in the film’s overall flow.
Most concerning however, is the fact that the film’s muddled presentation isn’t so much frustrating as it is dismissive. There is a certain point in watching Neowolf that the viewer will ultimately just give up caring about the film’s events and wish they were doing something else. For a longtime film fan such as myself, I consider this to be the worst of possible fates for cinema. Even if something is hated or reviled, there was at least something in the content that inspired a passionate response. However, if one is to leave a movie feeling listless and disinterested, certain to not remember it at all in a few week’s time…well, it almost suggests that there was no reason for the movie to exist in the first place. Though, perhaps in the case of Neowolf, this is the best of all possible outcomes.
Not that all of Neowolf is bad, per se, it just requires some sifting before any true gold is discovered within the confines of its filmic trappings. The film is shot very crisply, and some of the cinematography in the film goes above and beyond what is usually expected of direct-to-video fare. One senses that the film’s true director, Yvan Gauthier, had some semblance of artistic vision in place before the film became horribly mauled and transferred over to the care of Alan Smithee. However, glimpses of what the film might have been are certainly not enough to save it, but still give the audience enough material to take pause and consider another possible future for the rocking werewolves.
Also notable are some of the actors, who do their very best with such paltry material. In one particular case, actor Ryan Ross (Frat House Massacre, Meet the Mothers) must be singled out for some of the highest praise that can be given to this film. Playing Rosemary’s gay best friend, Ross was able to provide depth to a character that could easily have become a queeny cliché, but instead was developed into a fully realized human being. Too often does horror cinema resort to exploitative stereotypes, rendering minorities into mere shadows of what they truly are. That Neowolf takes time to show that not every gay man is a Streisand-obsessed fashion hound is a breath of fresh air, and also a knowing wink to the fact that genre cinema has a larger gay fan base than studios may want to realize. Ross’s character is indicative of this broader audience, and is to be applauded. Unfortunately, the shame lies within the fact that the character wasn’t allowed to come to fruition in a more fully realized film.
In summation, Neowolf has a litany of issues, though is not without some redeeming values. That said, it is not a movie that can easily be recommended in good conscience to any ardent fan of genre cinema. Poor pacing and shoddy decisions left audiences with a film that is best forgotten in the pantheon of B-horror, and is ultimately fodder for dollar bins everywhere.
With many apologies to my little wolves out there, I simply hate to ruin your rock-n-roll dreams, but in this case I urge you to howl along to a different song, because Neowolf certainly cannot carry the beat.
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