A WEREWOLF IN ENGLAND
Directed by: Charilie Steeds
Starring: Reece Connolly, Tim Cartwright, Natalie Martins |
Archie Whittock has the bad luck of being found guilty of murder, despite his claims that his "victim" was a werewolf who just happened to turn back to human form after death. Transported in the company of Parish Councilman Horrace Raycraft, they are forced to take refuge for the night at The Three Claws Inn due to a heavy storm. As they settle in for the night, they have no clue for what is in store for them…
A Werewolf In England is a rollicking good time. A lot of this is down to an excellent, playful and witty script and a very game cast.
We start off with a horse-drawn carriage racing through some woods, which immediately had me thinking of the numerous Hammer horror films which start in exactly the same way. Already I'm beginning to suspect that this is a cut above the usual low-budget horror films we see. Then we meet Archie and Horrace, and the witty scripted dialogue between the pair, and you start to appreciate the playfulness at hand.
This doesn't stop when we meet the elderly siblings, Martha and Vincent, who run the Inn and the prostitute Minnie who plies her trade there. The banter is great fun and laden with double entendres. Also staying for the night are the Reverend Pankhurst and the one-eyed Bernard Bagley.
During the night, Archie is able to slip his restraints and makes to escape, but instead discovers Martha and Vincent chopping their coach driver into meaty chunks. He's able to wake Horrace and the pair find themselves under siege by the demented duo. Not only that, but it’s a Blood Moon outside, and certain creatures of the night are very hungry…
This film manages to pack a lot of action into its 90 minute running time, The fx might be cheap but they are handled really well and there's certainly plenty of corn syrup being splashed around. There is an extended sequence which is a homage to The Evil Dead 2, involving a disembodied hand which attacks Archie. They do some interesting camera tricks to pull this off for the most part but its dénouement doesn’t work so well (I'm sure the film-makers would have loved to make it writhe around in the flames).
Not all the humour works unfortunately - perhaps I'm too old to appreciate the more scatalogical gag involving a werewolf having diarrhea all over two of the characters. Hopefully someone out there will appreciate it but not me.
The cast is really good here. Reece Connelly in his first credited screen role gives Archie an everyman quality - he's so unassuming and an unlikely hero who spends a lot of the film screaming in fear but still manages to put other people first. Tim Cartwright gives Horrace a larger-than-life quality and seems to be enjoying embodying the character.
THE VERDICT
In comparison to this, DOG SOLDIERS looks like a multi-million big budget movie. However despite it's smaller budget, A WEREWOLF IN ENGLAND shares that film's sense of wit and self-deprecating sense of humour. This is a film which truly entertains and delivers a proper, decent werewolf movie.