Even a man who is pure of heart,
And says his prayers by night,
May become a wolf
When the wolfsbane blooms
And the Autumn moon is bright.
- Old Gypsy Poem
Stephanie Meyer's Twilight was one of 2005's most talked about novels, especially among the 'tween and Harlequin set who regularly find their reading material at Target. Now, as we all know, the second of the Twilight film adaptations, New Moon, is primed to open two weeks from tonight. And if audience anticipation counts for anything in this freaky film world of ours, we'll see a Baldwin brother hand Taylor Lautner's torso its first Oscar next April.
And there you have the entire extent of abbracadabbling's Twilight: New Moon coverage, dabblers. Personal feelings aside, my hype and yours is best misspent elsewhere. I figure if the sequel even comes close to Chris Weitz's first installment, New Moon will still find its cheesy self quickly eclipsed.
Any one of this Holiday's 'Big Three' -- James Cameron's Avatar, Heath Ledger's The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, or Robert Downey Jr's Holmes -- could easily deck Twilight's halls. It's debatable, however, if New Moon will hang around long enough to give them that chance.
Like the books on which they're based, films of The Twilight Saga have a built-in obsolescence. Meyer's no J.K. Rowling, and New Moon's cast is better suited for the CW than the Silver Screen. Considering Hollywood's 2010 schedule and the current Blu-Ray boom, I'm thinking New Moon will rise just in time for Valentine's Day.
A clever carpe diem like that will put New Moon on my neighborhood Blockbuster Video's shelves Tuesday, February 9th. Now, despite what you might expect, I'll be there before the doors open to get my hands on a copy. That way, my best friend's kids are guaranteed their Friday play date so he and I can do the Fandango dance and get our butts in line for a real monster movie -- The Wolfman.
I remember talk of this film from a couple years back , but once the summer movie season kicked in to gear, I forgot all about it. As of yesterday, that's all about to change. Let's take a more monstrous approach to Universal Pictures' creature feature re-vamp.
Pieces of History
The Universal Pictures Company, like a brick and mortar Frankenstein monster, didn't get itself pulled together until 1925. This was the silent film era, and the company was already making movies, including their first two horrors, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, in 1923 and The Phantom of the Opera in 1925. Even in the face of the Great Depression, a true American horror story, Universal survived to pioneer the horror genre. Bela Lugosi's Dracula and Boris Karloff's Frankenstein premiered in 1931. The Mummy -- cinema's first film to feature the walking dead -- unraveled audiences in 1932, and literally everybody went to see, if they could, Claude Rains portray HG Wells' The Invisible Man in 1933.
Into Thin Air
It's a little known fanboy fact that one of th writers that adapted Wells' 1897 science fiction novel for Universal was none other than Philip Wylie, whose own book Gladiator was one of the chief inspirations for Jerry Siegel and Joe Schuster's Superman. But not long after The Invisible Man's successful showing, Universal suffered a series of financial set-backs that forced their fiends out of sight for several years. They remained invisible until 1941, when Lon Chaney Jr's The Wolf Man became a howling success. The Creature From The Black Lagoon surfaced fifteen years later, and its phenomenal success assured the horror franchise would remain afloat. The Universal Monsters were on the map.
Dell's 'horrible' comics featuring Frankenstein and his friends
Once bitten...
Universal Studio's originally tapped Mark Romanek to direct The Wolfman, hoping that the director might resurrect its monster franchise with the same flair he brought to the music videos he'd made for REM, Madonna, The Red Hot Chili Peppers, and David Bowie. But the films $100 million budget wasn't broad enough for Romanek's vision. His departure brought Joe Johnston (Jumanji, Jurassic Park III, Disney's Rocketeer) to the the director's chair.
Johnston's own vision seems to largely stem from his visual effects background; his resume includes the first Star Wars trilogy, Raiders of The Lost Ark, and Glen A. Larson's Battlestar Galactica. Universal must trust him, too. They approved an additional $12 million to transform Johnston's Wolfman into a fiercer, four-legged creature than originally conceived.
Still, those change-ups have cost Universal more than money, and until just recently, the scariest thing about The Wolfman has been its bad press. While the scheduled February 12th, 2010 release looks to be set in stone, it's actually the fourth time the movie's been delayed. After the film's public introduction at Universal Studio's Hollywood Theme Park last Halloween, The Wolfman's planned February 13th release was pushed back to April 3rd then later still to November 6th (yesterday). But after the film failed to make a presence at last summer's Comic-Con in San Diego, all was in doubt, until the new February 12th date was announced shortly afterward.
Breaking the Surface
It's easy to see why The Wolfman slipped my mind, and why most folks haven't even heard of it. Universal's hoping that won't last much longer. After too long a silence, the studio unleashed a second trailer for the film October 21st, and its pretty damn awesome. But how could it not be? With a cast like Benicio del Toro (Traffic), Emily Blunt (who we loved in The Devil Wears Prada), Hugo Weaving (V for Vendetta, The Lord of the Rings) and the man himself, Anthony Hopkins (The Silence of The Lambs, Thor), the trailer offers a great glimpse of The Wolfman's special effects, top-notch acting, and conveys a mood that's reminiscent of the Universal Monsters' horrific hey-day.
Take two minutes and check it out so you'll see what I mean: Trailer Addict has the 'B' Trailer here. And if you want to check it in High-Def, Apple.com's got what you want right here.
To top it all off, Universal blanketed movie sites across the internet yesterday with one of two different teaser posters of the film. They're the most noticeable pics on this blog, and I don't blame you if you've already seen them. I still can't get enough of the Wolfman's half-lit face on first one. Unlike so many of the horror flicks that inundate our box offices, this poster suggests what I've been gleaning from the tidbits of Wolfman news available. Toro's Lawrence Talbot is going to be front and center in this movie, and his nightmarish struggle with full-moon fever isn't going to play second-fiddle to fancy special effects.
While the first poster clearly conveys the duality at this movie's core, the second teaser Universal sent around Friday (which I hear is already making its way into theater lobbies) features Emily Blunt and a kind of stark-terror that only silver moonlight or a musical score by Danny Elfman can capture. You can see where the poster comes from -- the still shot just below hints that Blunt's Gwen Conliffe is in trouble, and as much as we want to sympathize, it's the wolf obscured by fog that's most interesting.
True Blood
Dying to know what The Wolfman's about, aren't you? Universal Studio's official press release says it best:
Inspired by the Universal film that launched a legacy of horror, The Wolfman brings the myth of a cursed man back to its iconic origins. Oscar winning actor Benicio Del Toro stars as Lawrence Talbot, a haunted nobleman lured back to his estate after his brother disappears. Reunited with his estranged father, Talbot sets out to find his brother, and discovers a horrifying destiny for himself. But Lawrence Talbot's childhood ended the day his mother died. After he left the sleepy Victorian hamlet of Blackmoor, he spent decades recovering and trying to forget. But when his brother's fiancée (Emily Blunt) tracks him down to help find her missing love, Talbot returns home to join the search. He learns that something with brute strength and insatiable bloodlust has been killing the villagers, and that a suspicious Scotland Yard inspector named Aberline (Hugo Weaving) has come to investigate.
As he pieces together the gory puzzle, he hears of an ancient curse that turns the afflicted into werewolves when the moon is full. Now, if he has any chance at ending the slaughter and protecting the woman he has grown to love, Talbot must destroy the vicious creature in the woods surrounding Blackmoor. But as he hunts for the nightmarish beast, a simple man with a tortured past will uncover a primal side to himself. One he never imagined existed.
Why We Care
By all accounts, Universal Pictures is making a well-intentioned stab to resuscitate the iconic monsters it once made famous -- vampires and werewolves and a host of the undead that paved the way for every kind of creature prowling and preying on popular culture. The Wolf Man, the first fright of horror's Silver Age, began a cinematic fang-fest that's only grown in popularity, and which has since spread to every other media, from comic books to cartoons to PS3 consoles to Stephanie Meyer pseudo-gore.
In the eighty years that have passed since Lon Chaney, Jr. first got furry, the classic movie monster as embodied by Universal's focal five has reached an archetypal place. That achievement has allowed for new (if not better) interpretations of the classic monsters -- among them the remakes of Dracula (1992) and Frankenstein (1994) -- and, far more often, their appropriation and dilution. Buffy The Vampire Slayer and Twilight: New Moon as examples of the former and latter, respectively. One must wonder, then, if something of the meaning, of the struggle of man's character and spirit, once contained in the originals has since been lost, and if so, can it be found again?
It's interesting to review Universal's filmography. More often than not, their movies are monster movies of one kind or another. Other than Mama Mia, Role Models, and Baby Mama, the vast majority of Universal's films of the past few years have kept them solidly within the realm of monsters. From Hellboy II to The Incredible Hulk, Land of the Lost to Public Enemies to Coraline and Frost/Nixon - which I'd argue was as much about monsters as their recent Drag Me To Hell -- Universal has stayed the course and focused on what it does best.
So let's trust them to put their best foot forward with The Wolfman. Granted, Universal's films haven't out-shined many of their competitors lately, but there's more riding on Benicio del Toro''s snarls than there ever was on Vin Diesel's Fast & Furious pectoralis.
Okay, that's not the best example. But let's not forget about Joe Johnston, either. The Wolfman is Johnston's last movie before he jumps into pre-production for Marvel Studio's First Avenger: Captain America. Marvel's Kevin Feige just signed the director last June, and considering that much of Captain America is expected to be a period-piece, Johnston's 'vintage' experience made him the obvious choice.
Johnston's all but ready to stand beside Jon Favreau (the director of the Iron Man movies) and Thor's Kenneth Branagh for the three of them to steer Marvel's movie division towards the holy Avengers grail in 2013. Four reschedules and nearly a year's delay on The Wolfman don't make a guy look any better, and with Feige and the whole world watching, Joe Johnston's going to do his damnedest ...and then some.
How would you weigh in the films covered in today's Studio 22? Are you all about New Moon? Did we do a disservice to Stephanie Meyer's literary genius? We've got Back Issues, so be in touch!
And don't forget to tell us what you think about Universal's reboot of The Wolfman. Will he make your Valentine's Day sweeter, or has he already scared you off? And what about the guy who's got everything to gain and just as much to loose, Joe Johnston? Is he the man to make Captain America, or should Marvel find itself another patriot act?
