Dead-Lands

Where did my wolfman review go? huh?

Did anyone besides me, ninja, and BR's older brother see this show?

BR did your brother actually like this show, or was he just telling me this? Cause I have heard both.

I have no idea I had no interest in seeing it so I never bothered to ask if he liked it

Ah I was just wondering, cause while I liked the wolfman transformations, the look and sound of the wolfman, I thought the plot and acting where pretty darn terrible. Yet when I talked with your brother He said it was great and didn't think the acting was bad at all. Yet I hear from others that he didn't actually like it.

I think if you like old school horror movies..... this one is worth a rent (or a netflix online watch when it becomes available) but I wouldn't go out to see it.

I hate it. It's awfulness sneaks up on you which is why I didn't walk out of it. I was completely surprised by how horrible it was...

Even the special effects are bad. The story is bad. The dialog is boring. The characters don't make any sense.

It's just a mess. The worst though is the "wolfman" It's basically the costume they wore for the 1950s wolfman movies. It's extremely cheesy. And not even expensive high grade cheese... it's cheap Velveeta cheese. I'd strongly suggest you forget this movie was even made.

haha, I thought the fact that the wolfman was the same as the Black n White version was it's only redeeming quality, but other than that I fully agree. Saying the awfulness sneaks up on you is pretty accurate. It's like a really bad car crash you can't stop looking at

Still my favorite is Wolf by ol' jack.

Skip one minute in:

Wow really? I hated that show.

Nicholson is freakin awesome

I wont deny that, I just hated that show as a werewolf show.

Why? He did the whole wolf thing in the least cheesy way possible. He also BECAME the wolf.

I like movies that have some kind of meaning to them. There was an actual philosophical angle to the whole film that is absent from most cheap films.

They got away from the whole Gypsy, full moon, bit that isn't really important and focused instead on the beast. He has this wild thing growing in him. It makes him stronger. He finds freedom. He finds power. But the price is his humanity.

And in the end he chooses the wild. As a man he was miserable... a failure... abused by his peers... no respect. But as the wolf he was a predator. He ruled his domain. He got his meat. He got his woman. He got respect.

The movie ACTUALLY had a story unlike every other werewolf movies I've ever seen. How can you say it was bad?

Just explain the logic of it to me. Do you rate goodness by how campy and cheesy things are? That's ok if that's your scale. To each his own. I just to know if I'm missing something here.

I guess I don't want a deep philosophical meaning to a werewolf movie, I want a mindless action flick where a guy or group of guys turn into half beast half man creatures and rec havoc on the countryside. I wanted a monster movie and thats not what it was, therefore when I saw it... I hated it.

It's like trying to make a vampire movie into a feel good sports flick, or a zombie movie have a love story (acutally I've seen a bunch of these, kinda funny). Monster movies should be about monsters, not some dude that got a Tony Robbinson motivation speech through a bite from a rabid dog, then turns into a dog at the end of the flick.

course if you wanted a monster movie with a higher purpose, I could see your point. I just like my monster movies to be about monsters is all.

So you don't see the underlying meaning behind the monsters? I mean... don't you know there is a point behind Frankenstein's monster? Don't you know that the Vampire has a story with a point behind it?

Every one of these monsters means something. They're like mythic figures each with a history and place in the universe.


Vampires in their original form are men that sold their souls for eternal life and power. They sold their souls to the devil and in return the devil mixed their blood with demonic blood or satanic blood. That is why they can't go out during the day and why they can't deal with holy symbols. It is also why they must be invited to enter a home. The devil never enters uninvited. It's also why they hunger for mortal blood. The whole thing is basically a cautionary tail against selling your soul because the devil ALWAYS screws you on the deal. And selling your soul is just a metaphor for fatally compromising your moral standards for any gain. People sell their souls all the time for fame, fortune, power, whatever. But in most cases the price of that compromise is that you don't walk out of it whole. Bits and pieces of you are missing. You might become a monster. You might be a tortured creature. Whatever happens you're very unlikely to compromise your morals profoundly and then be ok afterwards. Evil men don't start out that way. They make a deal at some point and are tainted by it for the rest of their days. This is one of the reasons the new Vampire movies are such complete crap. Because there is no moral component to the affliction... and in many cases people are "given" this against their will. It doesn't work that way. That isn't a vampire. It's something else. The Vampire soulless damned. Pitiless. Without hope. Without remorse. Without hesitation. Corruption incarnate. Not good boyfriend material.

Frankenstein's monster is about man playing god... basically man playing god badly. It's to flesh out the mysteries of creation and hopefully get a better understanding of the human soul itself. Who are we? What is the world? If I can make a thing out of scraps of flesh and lightening... what is all this?

The werewolves are about the relationship between man and nature. It's about our bestial side. Our savage passions... our cruelty... our hunger for the wild.

Zombies also have a place. They're mostly about the pressures of modern life. Billions of faceless people pressing in upon us at all times... hungry... stupid. There is a terror in that. The salvation is always leaving the cities... escaping society and building a world on your own. To the extent that any zombie movie has any meaning it tends to play upon the relationship between the individual within very large impersonal societies.


See? I look for this when I see a monster movie. As you can guess I'm typically disappointed. But these are the only monster stories that are even worth reading/watching for me. They have a meaning and a mythology. Without the meaning it just meaningless special effects.