Movie Reviews
Wolf Man
Movie Review
It’ll be good for us.
So Blake Lovell tells his go-getter wife, Charlotte, when he suggests they leave the city and spend a summer in Oregon.
They’ve had a rough time of it lately. Blake, a writer, is between jobs right now—and that means he’s been a full-time dad to their daughter, Ginger. That’s been great; the two of them have never been closer.
But that also makes Charlotte, an ambitious journalist with an eye on deadlines and a hunger for the front page, a familial third wheel.
While Blake makes dinner, Charlotte’s arguing with her editor. While Blake takes Ginger out for ice cream, Charlotte runs after the latest scandal. And while that’s great for Charlotte’s career and all, Charlotte feels less like Ginger’s mom and more like a houseguest—and not an always welcome one at that. She and Blake are arguing more than ever. And if the couple keeps following this trajectory, they won’t be a couple much longer.
A trip to Oregon might be just the ticket, Blake feels, to heal these long-festering issues.
After all, he’ll need to go to Oregon anyway. His long-missing father has finally been officially declared dead by the state. Blake needs to pack up the old family house and tie up loose ends.
So he thinks, why don’t they all go? Spend some time together? After all, Charlotte can work from anywhere. Or, hey, she could even take a vacation for once. No harm getting reacquainted with your husband and daughter, right? Plus, it’s beautiful there. The views never get old.
Sure, Blake might’ve downplayed just how remote this corner of Oregon was. Internet? You’ll be lucky to have power. And he never even thinks to dredge up some less-idyllic childhood memories; ones that left his granite-tough father trembling. Ones about a monster in the woods.
Blake had long waved away such legends. Monster? Pish.
But then, as he drives a moving van carrying his small family, someone—something—appears in the headlights. The van careens off the road and tumbles through trees, precariously coming to a stop in the branches of one of them. Charlotte and Ginger scamper to relative safety. But the thing swipes at Blake before he can do the same. The attack takes less time than an eye blink—so fast that when Blake sees the blood on his arm, he assumes he must’ve suffered a cut from the glass.
Charlotte looks at the jagged wound, and she knows it’s not a simple cut. Nope, that thing took a chunk out of Blake’s arm. And who knows what sort of bacteria that creature was carrying. Rabies? Tetanus? Best get Blake to a doctor, pronto.
She’s right to be worried. Blake is infected—but not by something a doctor can treat with a shot or antibiotics.
The trip to Oregon? It’ll be good for us, Blake promised.
But that might not be a promise that Blake can keep.