OnDemand viewing June 23rd in Chicago, IL. My wife and I thought the description seemed interesting so we took a chance. As fan of the werewolf genre, it seemed like a good idea. The film received a 71% Rotten Tomatoes rating and that sealed the deal.
First time director Fritz Böhm, who also co-wrote the film, gives us a tale of a young girl who's held in a room by her father (the always creepy Brad Dourif) who tells her stories of the "wildling." She grows up before our eyes and starts getting injections for an "illness" as she reaches the age of puberty. One night her "father" shoots himself and Anna (Bel Powley) is taken into custody by Sheriff Ellen (Liv Tyler, who also received a producing credit). Ellen takes Anna into her home.
It doesn't take long for Anna to realize she's a little different than the other teenagers. She slowly starts seeing changes and has reoccurring nightmares. Ellen's brother Ray takes her to a party and things go off the rails after Anna has an encounter with local bully Lawrence. Anna is taken into custody and proceeds to escape. Her "father" recovers from his self inflicted wounds and decides to round up the old posse of wildling hunters in order to kill Anna. Will she be able to get away?
After seeing this film, the Rotten Tomatoes rating was too high. The film has a reasonable run time of only 92 minutes but it just seems to drag on in parts. Then there's the scene where her "father" decides to go after Anna. He clearly knew what she was, why not kill her when he had the chance in his home? He couldn't bear killing her but shoots himself (FAIL) and then when she starts to transform, then he has no problem killing her. Then there's James Le Gros' character, Wolf Man (real subtle). He's a guy who walks around in, you guessed it, wolf pelts.
No really this guy hangs out in town. No job. Nothing. It's totally not weird.
He hangs around town and no one seems to look twice at him. His only purpose is to give Anna exposition about what she really is and the local history of the wildlings.
The acting was fine and there's some nice cinematography but the story seemed weak to me. It tried to be an interesting take on the genre but it came out like a cross between Teen Wolf, Wolf and American Werewolf in London. It didn't work.
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