The Company of Wolves

[amelia_petkova]

I was finally able to see this movie, based on several short stories by Angela Carter. I think all the stories were from her collection "The Bloody Chamber." (Watched it on YouTube, of course.) I suppose I could write a good, long in-depth commentary on the themes in it, but for now you're getting my immediate reactions.

As usual, spoilers are beneath the cut.


--Angela Lansbury is one scary grandmother. Now whenever I hear her name, I'll think of Granny and not Mrs. Potts.

--OMG Granny's head got knocked off!!! (She put up a kick-ass fight till then, though.)

--The actress who plays Rosaleen is very talented and pretty.

--There were two of the stories I didn't like: The brief one about a boy meeting the people in the car; and the one told at the end by Rosaleen, about the werewolf girl.

--Rosaleen's wanna-be boyfriend in the village was so annoying and not at all good-looking. A wolf could have killed him in a second.

--Ha, the annoying sister got killed

--For me, the wolves' transformations in the old-school style were scarier than any modern special effects. (ex. In the first story, when the one werewolf is tearing his face off.) The same applies to An American Werewolf in London.

--Rosaleen kicks ass in the cottage fight! (Must have gotten that from Granny.) At first she's all, "Ha, got a knife!" and then when that doesn't work, she pulls the werewolf's gun out of thin air.

--Interesting blending of time/worlds: You think it's any fairy tale village, but I saw an electric lamp and an alarm clock.

--"Jesus, what big teeth you have!" fell over laughing at that

--Granny is a member of the She-Woman Man-Haters Club.

--"I'm sorry; I didn't know you could cry." I did feel sorry for the wolf when Rosaleen said that. He was actually a bit good-looking when he first began turning.

--I didn't like the very end of the story; the wolves running through Rosaleen's real-life house were good, but I wanted something to happen other than her just sitting up and screaming.



I'll have to watch the movie again. Hopefully I can find it on video or DVD someday. It gave me a lot of ideas for a story I began a couple years ago, that's about werewolves and has elements of "Little Red Riding Hood."

Comments

[treewitch.livejournal.com]

The company of wolves is one of my favourite films, which I would watch late at night when I was about 15 on a very battered video when I had taped it off the TV. I never even knew it was based on a short story until I started reading the novels by Angela Carter - there is a short story of the same name in The Bloody Chamber and other stories in the book are also twists and takes on the traditonal faerie tale.

Comany is full of symbolism. When I watched it with friends they thought it was supposed to be scary but it is so much more than the traditional werewolf film. There are themes throughout the film about loss of innocence and virginity and growing into a woman - the wolves crashing through Rosaleens window at the end shows that she has finally grown up, excaped childhood and dress up and dolls and tasted what it is to be a woman.

My favourite part of the movie is where the she-wolf crawls out of the well. (That was Danielle Dax, the goth singer in the 80's). It shows that even the wolves are capable of love and hurt and loyalty, even if they belong to a darker realm of being (kind of like the Cylons in Battlestar Galactica, hee hee hee.)

I could waffle about this film all day! Have you read any of Angela Carter's novels? I highly recommend "Nights at the Circus" and "The Magic Toyshop".:)

[amelia-petkova.livejournal.com]

I haven't read any of Angela Carter's novels yet, but I do have a copy of Burning Your Boats which is a collection of all of her short stories.

I've got videos like yours, that I taped off TV and practically worn to bits because of watching them so much. And how inconsiderate of the TV programmers never to show the movie or whatever again so that I could make a new tape!

I like the image of the werewolf girl, climbing in and out of the well, but I don't think it was one of the better stories (at least in the movie--I like the written werewolf girl stories).

About the loss of innocence, growing up, etc.: definitely! Everybody is always telling Rosaleen that she has to be aware and watch out, especially in the woods. The ending scene makes more sense now that I read your comment but it still feels odd to me, comparing it against how she reacted in the dream. (Then again, if a bazillion wolves broke into my house, I'd be startled, too! I know, I know, symbolism. :) ) It's very memorable when Granny asks, "What did you do to my granddaughter?" and the wolf says, "Nothing she didn't want."