Big Screen Review: The Wolfman, the Last Station
The Wolfman.
The Wolfman
Finally, movies have been made featuring all three of Universal Studios’ most famous trio of monsters from the golden age—Frankenstein’s monster, Dracula, and now the Wolfman.
Many more monster films are still yet to be made, but can they top what the Wolfman has accomplished? Most likely not.
This film will satisfy the most diehard of gothic horror fans by providing a very foreboding story that borrows more from folktale than from Hollywood.
What transpires is very dark, moody, and sinister. It would make for a good, scary campfire story.
This film challenges long-time fans of the 1941 classic to guess how the fate of Lawrence Talbot (Benicio del Toro) will pan out.
And with a reclusive father, Sir John Talbot (Anthony Hopkins), what befalls Talbot Manor is reminiscent of another gothic tale—the Fall of the House of Usher.
Academy Award-winning visual-effect artist Joe Johnston does a decent job of directing a very atmospheric piece.
And composer Danny Elfman provides some intense music to draw audiences into the fold. Clever breaks in the action are provided in just the right places before all hell breaks loose.
Not even the love of a woman can soothe the savage beast.
-Ed Sum
The Last Station
American director Michael Hoffman’s latest film, the Last Station, opens on a mist-shrouded morning with the colours of dawn heightened and super real. It’s as if the viewer has awoken in a Merchant Ivory historical drama, and it’s the template for this intriguing yet bloated biopic.
The Last Station is a stage-y history lesson that will attract some and repel others. The subject matter is fascinating as the story focuses on Leo Tolstoy (Christopher Plummer) who, in his later years, was considered by many to be a saint, comparable to Gandhi.
In the late 19th century, Tolstoy had thousands of fanatical followers; many vowed celibacy and practiced vegetarianism to be closer to him. Tolstoy was a Russian rock star with scruples, his writing so powerful that devotees hung on his every word.
Tolstoy’s wife, Sofya, fully realized by the brilliant Helen Mirren (the Queen), is the emotional centre of this tale. As the thankless wife, Sofya expresses early on how she copied War and Peace out for Tolstoy, by hand, no less than six times (over 1,400 pages). Now that’s devotion!
The other big boon to the film is cinematographer Sebastian Edschmid, a veteran of lush period films like Adam Resurrected and Black Death. His deft eye and saturated colours makes everything grandiose.
Sadly, the film gets caught up in soap-operatic elements and relies on too many stock characters to really elevate it beyond the made-for-TV-like atmosphere that ultimately settles over it.
-Shane Scott-Travis
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