Retellings 1: "When the wolfbane blooms"

Two recent event movies have just been issued on DVD (one was a hit, one was not) and both are retellings of classic stories. The Wolfman continues Universal Studios' misguided attempts at revitalizing their horror franchises of the 30's and 40's, though this one gets marks for atmosphere and for sticking with the original storyline. Larry Talbot (Lon Chaney Jr. in the 40's, Benico Del Toro here) returns to the family mansion on the moors after his brother is found dead and horribly mutilated. His father (Claude Rains then, Anthony Hopkins now) welcomes him with not quite fully open arms, and he gets involved with an old gypsy woman (in 1941, the wonderful Maria Ouspenskaya; in 2010, the very good Geraldine Chaplin) and an attractive young woman named Gwen (Evelyn Ankers/Emily Blunt, both of whom are stuck in thankless roles). Talbot winds up getting bitten by a wolfman and turns into one himself, with tragic consequences.

The biggest difference between the two versions, aside from the obvious upgrade in makeup and gore effects in the current film (and the new movie making "wolfman" one word rather than two), is the identity of the lycanthrope who gives Talbot the bite. [SPOILER] In the Chaney version, it's the gypsy woman's son, a relatively unimportant character played by Bela Lugosi; here, it's Talbot's father, which could have been an interesting twist if the screenplay had actually made either the son or father a rounded character. But that doesn't happen. I have never liked Del Toro, as I find him to be an mumbling, unattractive, uncharismatic block of wood, but at least here, he doesn't mumble. Hopkins is very good as usual; it seems as if he's operating at half-speed, but his half-speed is just dandy. (At least he's not just phoning it in, as Michael Caine and Sean Connery do sometimes.) Emily Blunt, who I like, is totally wasted.

There are two other good things here. One is the gray Gothic atmosphere--I'm kinda tired of all the color-leaching that's the craze these days, turning all action movies into gray-blue-white with occasional blood-red smudges across the screen, but it works here. The other is the wolfman makeup and effects in general. Especially effective is the way the beast runs, starting on two legs then crouching down to four. It's obviously CGI but it works. The DVD contains a longer unrated director's cut which is usually the occasion for harder-than-R-rated gore, but here, much of the missing footage is actually interesting backstory in the beginning which helps us understand the characters a bit more, and contains a nifty cameo by Max Von Sydow who is missing from the theatrical cut. Next time, Tim Burton's Alice.