Germany, 2021
Review:
JA Kerswell
Something of a lover letter to Michele Soavi’s STAGEFRIGHT (1987) and other backstage 80’s slashers. A group of young workers preparing a theatre for an important event are hunted down by someone in a wolf mask with an oversized claw. This German slasher plays it pleasingly old school. However, although passably entertaining, it sadly doesn’t quite warrant a standing ovation.
The Alp Theatre is preparing a production based on the Grimm Brothers’ fairytale The Wolf and the Seven Young Goats. The owner, Mr Richter (Wolfgang Riehm), is keen to reverse declining numbers and plans a special Halloween matinee to showcase his new production. One of his staff, Emma (Kiana Klysch), is preparing to leave her job to pursue her dreams of becoming a movie actress—much to Richter’s disappointment that she wasn’t interested in appearing on stage. After everyone has gone home, one of the actresses and the play’s writer go back into the theatre when they realise that their phones are missing—only to be attacked and murdered by someone in a wolf mask.
Later that night, Emma and six other young workers turn up at the theatre to get it ready for its make-or-break Halloween showing of the new play the next day. However, as they get to work, they begin to disappear one by one, and a handful of survivors realise that they have been locked in with a very hirsute killer …
THE WOLF has all the elements for a rousing slasher movie but is curiously flat for much of its running time—although the unmasking of the killer and a couple of stings in its tail adds a bit of zip. It is hard to pinpoint quite why it doesn’t thrill like it should. Basing itself on the Grimm Brothers’ fairy tale is a nice touch, with the employees the seven young goats (something reflected in the emblems they wear on their work shirts) being picked off by a killer in wolf’s clothing. The cast is pretty good, too—especially Klysch as Emma (a rare lesbian lead character). The film has a pleasingly retro synth score, and the killer’s POV is shown with a suitably sanguine hue. It variably splashes the stage blood about, too, with a mix of splashy gore and off-screen deaths. An irony is that, at the beginning of the movie, the play’s director tells the lead actress that she needs to give more—and that seems to be part of the problem here. It never quite achieves a gallop but tends to canter along without quite building that sense of excitement that the best slasher movies do.
Part of the problem is how it looks. Although well-framed and crispy shot on high-definition video, it misses the baroque lushness of something shot on film—perhaps partly because of the theatre’s modern setting. The primary colours attempt to evoke the mystery of Mario Bava (as does a scene set in a room of mannequins), but everything looks a little too digital and often, skin colours have that ugly orange hue cast by the pervading artificial light. It perhaps doesn’t help that some of the characters make seemingly inexplicable decisions. A case in point is when one of the workers appears panicked and covered in blood, and he falls and knocks himself out; his co-workers, for some reason, tie him to a chair rather than try and help him. The killer’s disguise occasionally makes for a few creepy moments, but the giant claw with knives looks a little hokey—so much so that they ditch it in the end for a butcher’s knife.
For some reason, THE WOLF was misleading sold via its advertising art as a werewolf flick. It isn't. There is nothing supernatural here. It's a slasher through and through. Although, not surprisingly, the comparisons with Soavi’s theatre-bound slasher/giallo mashup aren’t necessarily complimentary. However, it isn’t a bad film per se. Believe me, I’ve seen a lot, lot worse.
BODY COUNT 7:
Female 2 / Male 5
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THE WOLF trailer