As a lifelong gamer, I learned to dread these five words when they are used to describe a film: “based on a video game.” At best, you usually get something entertaining but clearly aimed at kids (like an animated Super Mario Bros. Movie); at worst, you end up with something that fails as both film and as a game adaptation (like the live-action Super Mario Bros. movie). Fortunately, Werewolves Within is both a nearly perfect horror comedy and a nearly perfect game adaptation.
The premise of Werewolves Within (based loosely on the video game of the same name) is that a Forest Ranger newly assigned to a quiet town wants to settle in and get to know all of its quirky residents. When the townies start turning up dead, he must lead the charge in finding out who among them is a murderer before it’s too late. It becomes increasingly clear that this threat isn’t quite human, and unless the ranger finds the right people to trust, the entire town will end up as werewolf chow.
While the cast is wildly talented (more on that very soon), the real reason Werewolves Within is so good is that it was directed by Josh Ruben, the same director who brought us Scare Me (a personal favorite) and, more recently, Heart Eyes. Ruben has established himself as a real triple threat (he wrote, directed, and starred in Scare Me) who is a major rising star in the horror world. He’s no John Carpenter (at least, not yet), but if you like scary movies, Ruben is a name you can always rely on to deliver.
In Werewolves Within, he delivers a great cast, including Sam Richardson (best known for his role in Veep), who is all warm charisma as an amiable Forest Ranger. Richardson’s character is in over his head before the first body drops to the ground.
Harvey Guillén (best known to genre fans for his role in What We Do In the Shadows), meanwhile, plays a colorful yoga guru, and Catherine Curtin (best known for Orange Is the New Black) plays the owner of the lodge turned murder scene. Wayne Duvall (best known for O Brother, Where Art Thou?) is quite the natural playing a bigger-than-life businessman.
While Richardson is great as a lead, the highlight of Werewolves Within is Milana Vayntrub, who plays a perfectly perky postal woman. Vayntrub is still best known for her role in several iconic AT&T commercials, but she came within a hair’s breadth of playing Squirrel Girl in the MCU. She is so effortlessly wonderful here that every time I rewatch it (which is quite often), I am increasingly convinced Marvel missed out by not having this squirrelly stunner in its cinematic universe.
Collectively, the cast brings to life a film that alternates between coziness (boy, do I want to spend a few nights at that lodge!) and creepiness (when the fur starts flying, this movie can be genuinely terrifying). The characters have a great chemistry with each other and create the kind of great vibes that will keep you watching. Trust me: if you aren’t hooked on Werewolves Within by the time Vayntrub starts dancing to the beat of a vintage jukebox, you might need to check yourself for a pulse.
People do crazy things in the full moon, including critics. Though horror often turns off professional reviewers, Werewolves Within clawed its way to an 86 percent critical score on Rotten Tomatoes. Reviewers praised the movie for being a horror comedy that served up laugh-out-loud moments along with serious scares. That’s my favorite kind of film, and it didn’t take Werewolves Within to become one of my favorite comfort food movies to watch whenever I need to enjoy a few good blood-soaked punchlines.
Will you agree that Werewolves Within is a criminally overlooked classic and killer horror comedy, or is this one movie you’d like to shoot with a silver bullet? You won’t know until you stream it on Hulu and see what all the fuzz (er, fuss) is about. Afterward, I think you’ll embrace my simple plan to fix modern filmmaking: more Josh Ruben behind the camera and more Milana Vayntrub in front of it!
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