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Post by stefancrosscoe on Sept 26, 2017 13:10:47 GMT
"You pay too much attention to your granny. She knows a lot but she doesn't know everything. And if there's a beast in men, it meets its match in women too."A young girl named Rosaleen (Sarah Patterson) find herself being haunted by having powerful and frightening dreams that involves everything from familiar faces to nightmarish creatures and those where she is to embark upon a long and dangerous journey through a dark and unpredictable forest, and where the most important rule to remember is: "Never stray from the path, never eat a windfall apple and never trust a man whose eyebrows meet in the middle!". Neil Jordan's The Company of Wolves is a beautiful and very well made british, atmospheric gothic/fantasy film which does in some ways act out like some very dark/feverish dream within a dream and one that is backed up with the talents of David Warner, Angela Lansbury, Brian Glover, Stephen Rea, Terence Stamp and Sarah Patterson along with a great use of scenery, music and some truly spectacular special effects.
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Post by Chalice_Of_Evil on Oct 22, 2017 6:26:44 GMT
This is one of my top werewolf movies ever. Though I never did realise that the lead character’s name was Rosaleen, as when anyone said her name, it always sounded to me like Rosalee. It wasn’t until sometime later when looking at the IMDB page for the movie I discovered what her name actually was (or maybe I discovered it when watching the end credits. I forget).
What I love about this movie first and foremost is the ‘atmosphere’. It’s downright unsettling in places. I first watched this movie when I was quite young-ish, so that’s probably why it had such an impact on me. There were some truly disturbing moments in the film – the most obvious one being the face-ripping-off werewolf transformation. That was fairly disturbing when I first saw it, plus it was totally unexpected that it was going to get so gruesome - the movie was on during the middle of the day, so not exactly the time to be expecting to see something like that).
Another disturbing moment, though not so much *now*, was Angela Lansbury getting decapitated and her head shattering like a vase. That was certainly ‘WTF’-worthy. On rewatch, though, it was just sort of morbidly amusing. I did get to watch the movie on TV again some time ago. I think I may have missed the beginning (which really annoyed me, as I wanted to record it and keep it for watching whenever). Previously I’d watched the whole movie on YouTube, as at that stage it didn’t seem like it was ever going to be on TV again since the first time I saw it. If it’s ever on TV again, I plan to record it. As it’s one I don’t mind rewatching on occasion.
I found Sarah Patterson strangely alluring as Rosaleen. She had this quality about her that made *her* almost seem ‘otherworldly’ (which, given all the other strangeness in the movie, was probably appropriate). She'd sometimes act a certain way that made me wonder what was going through her head (nevermind the fact that she was told repeatedly by Granny to stick to the path and avoid men whose eyebrows met in the middle...and she kind of ignored that advice in the end and got cozy with one one such creepy unibrowed dude).
I also couldn’t help but feel a bit sorry for the guy who clearly had the hots for her in the movie. She wasn’t the nicest to him, and that bit where she arrived in the white limo (looking pretty dang fine, I thought) and gave him some sort of oil to rub on his chest (what was it?) which then made hair appear, and his “Noooooooooooo!” somewhat weirded me out at the time. Sorry my thoughts on the movie are all over the place, but it’s been a fair while since I watched it.
I liked that there were separate little stories within the main story of the film. They added to what was already an unsettling feeling to the movie, I thought. The wedding scene was kind of creepy, but at the same time sort of had a ‘lightness’ to it as well (might’ve been the music).
Speaking of the music, it added SO much to the film, I found. Especially at the end. That scene with the wolves galloping up the stairs/crashing through the window into Rosaleen’s bedroom was so very creepy to me, and a large part of why I found it to be so was because of the music used. Really, seeing a bunch of wolves running in and of itself does exactly scream ‘creepy’, but the way it was shot and Rosaleen’s scream at seeing them freaked me out. I think another part of why I found it such an effective moment was because, up until that point, she’d seemed more or less calm, even in the face of freaky situations. So it was weird for me seeing someone who had appeared pretty ‘chilled’ most of the time (not to mention she’d just been sitting and patting a wolf in a prior scene) suddenly freaking out like any *normal* person would be if a pack of wolves came crashing into their bedroom.
I also much preferred that they went for ‘normal’ wolves with glowing eyes than trying to create some sort of monstrous beasts that simply did not work. It was probably cheaper just to add the ‘glowing effect’ to the eyes of them anyway. This was also the first time I’d ever seen a werewolf transformation done where the wolf snout emerged from the human mouth. It wasn’t until much later in time that the TV series Hemlock Grove came along and did this as well, having somewhat ‘refined’ the effect (and added even more grossness), though I’ll always remember this movie as being the first (that I know of) one to do it (then again, I haven’t seen that many werewolf movies, so maybe others beat them to it. I wouldn’t know).
I liked that the movie was just basically made up of big sets. I’ve grown so tired of CGI settings/scenery in things now, that I really appreciate how ‘real’ the sets felt in this movie. If done right, they can make you buy into the world which the characters inhabit (even if, on closer inspection, you might be able to see the ‘fakeness’ of it all). I never saw ‘sets’, just this world in which Rosaleen was part of – and what a strange/scary world it was.
Again, apologies for my rather ‘fractured’ review. This is what happens when I haven’t seen a movie in some time – my memories of it get all muddled up.
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