Image courtesy of impawards.com
Director:
James Isaac
Cast:
Jason Behr .Varek
Elias Koteas .Jonas
Rhona Mitra .Rachel
Kim Coates .Zo
Natassia Malthe .Sonja
Matthew Knight .Timothy
Sarah Carter .Katherine
Tom Jackson .Will
Rogue Johnston .Grenier
Barbara Gordon .Nana
Shawn Roberts .Adam
Lyriq Bent .Doak
Skinwalkers is a film that instills its viewers with so much apathy that it is hard to muster up enough ire to even dress it down in this review. The movie is so trite and boring that it is easier to just forget about it than to conjure up enough feelings to offer a passionate response about it. While it would be pleasing to mail it in, much like the creators of Skinwalkers, I will instead exhibit some pride in my craft. Pride in itself is not the only thing the film lacks, but it is a great place to start.
Skinwalkers seems almost embarrassed that it is a werewolf movie. It misses the mark on all the best aspects of being a werewolf movie. There is a litany of reasons people enjoy this particular genre and Skinwalkers is either lacking solid effort, or completely missing the mark, in many of these areas. The werewolf makeup and effects are pathetic (the obligatory changing scene is missing altogether); the group of “evil” werewolves are uninteresting, uncool, and come across (both explicitly and implicitly) as junkies; and any sexuality exuded by the creatures feels forced and awkward. Director James Isaac is so intent on hiding the film’s shame that he doesn’t leave the story or characters and room to breathe.
In fairness, the story puts much stress on the idea that being a werewolf is wrong and un-Christian. The “good” werewolves protecting a half-breed savior (Matthew Knight) until his thirteenth birthday come across as Puritans on a witch hunt. They take such precautions against the evil within themselves that it is a bit surprising that they don’t up and kill themselves to save the world from such horrible beasts. When did being a supernatural being become such a burden? The Puritan werewolves bear their cross so that their boy savior may do something, that something never becomes clear. Even the ending fails to offer any true closure to that story arc, instead we are bewilderingly set up for a sequel that we should all pray never comes.
How the producers could begin to conjecture that viewers might want more of this story and these characters is dumbfounding. Nothing about Skinwalkers is clever or unique. It is a perfect example of taking the framework of a concept and doing nothing with it. Werewolf mythology is not expanded upon in the least, nor does the film explore werewolf lore in any significant way. It is remarkable that the filmmakers were able to make a monster movie that is more mundane and less scary than an average R.L. Stein Goosebumps book. Somehow they found a way, though, and they still have the nerve to offer a cliffhanger ending.
Such a plot device suggests a pretentiousness within the filmmakers that does not surface at all for the entire movie preceding the final credits. It is incredible to see a movie that is ashamed and brimming with pride all at once. Maybe the skinwalkers in Skinwalkers are not all that different from the self-righteous pilgrims they (intentionally?) emulate.
