Naively, some critics cite Wolf as a failure because it fails to evoke fear in its viewer. First, I would remind such reviewers of who the director is: Mr. Mike Nichols. Obviously, given the director’s resume, he will approach a script wanting and demanding more, especially if he is working within a genre which itself is typecast, if–for no other reason–to push boundaries and to challenge himself. Secondly, and more importantly, such a sentiment appeals to a very limited, surface reading of what a horror film can be. Many works that fall under said category do not set out to overtly scare, but use the genre as a metaphor for real-life terrors, which is exactly the case with Nichols’s corporate satire.
Will Randall (Jack Nicholson) is a worn, yet optimistic, book editor for McCleesh. When the publishing house changes hands, Raymond Alden (Christopher Plummer) informs Will that he has been replaced by Will’s younger, more Machiavellian coworker, Stewart Swinston (James Spader). To add insult to injury, Will discovers that–not content with only taking his job–Stewart is also having an affair with Will’s wife of sixteen years, Charlotte (Kate Nelligan). However, Will quickly rebounds after being bitten by a wolf, finding himself feeling twenty years younger as he plots his revenge: He begins seeing Alden’s daughter, Laura (Michelle Pfeiffer), atop proceeding to blackmail his employer. Yet, shortly after realigning his life, Charlotte is murdered as Will becomes the primary suspect.
Nichols brings to dazzling life Jim Harrison and Wesley Strick’s biting (sorry) satire of corporate politics in which only the more animalistic, predatory of beasts survive as the meek and humble become their prey. We are first met by Will, a weathered, yet honest, veteran editor of the publishing industry who has a loyal author fan base (cunningly satirical, the artful–in their naïve idealism–are the only group to readily exhibit reverence for ethical dictums this day and age). Will is the type of man who would never utter a derogatory word about his most hated colleague even if you held a gun to his head. But this poignant trademark of the character is the crux for Nichols’s film in that when Will’s younger, backstabbing coworker takes his senior’s job and wife, the metaphor for the carnivorous corporate realm is made manifest as Will, having been bitten by a wolf, finds himself not only feeling more vigilant, but also more predatory, as he unwaveringly blackmails his boss (with a pack–sorry once again–of lies) and coworker while pursuing a female much younger than him, whose favor he gains after boldly outlining her less-than-admirable personality traits.
If there was ever a hairy actor physically begging to be cast as a werewolf, it was Nicholson. The only other performer which comes to mind that might rightly call dibs on such a character, it would be Robin Williams. However I doubt that Williams could have succeeded in making Will’s quick transition seem so naturalistic, which is all the more admirable considering he undergoes a complete personality shift in less than a month (in reel time, a handful of scenes). In this regard, Laura’s “transformation” juxtaposes Will’s as she sheds her shell of distain for a man whom she knows is literally a monster, yet we can see why: She admires his drive to claim what is rightfully his in an unjust world.
Yet what is more impressive is Nichols’s restraint as he resists making his easily painted black or white characters appear gray throughout. Even though Vijay Alezias (Om Puri), a scholar of the occult whom Will seeks for advice, states that lycanthropy permits one to experience “power without guilt, love without doubt,” Will never utilizes his newfound gifts in a gratuitously vindictive manner, but merely employs them in order to reclaim his hard-earned rights. Idealistically, Nichols offers us a vision which recognizes the id and the superego’s urges and the manner in which to appropriately resort to them.
Accolades are forthcoming to make-up artist Rick Baker once again, whose gifts are never heedlessly implemented in a genre picture where the temptation is not always resisted, as the final segment of the film presents one of the more effective portraits of a werewolf set to screen. However, admittedly, and perhaps this is part of Nichols’s parody, it is hard to take such a monster seriously given that Nicholson is wearing penny loafers during every attack scene. Also, it was during this film that I first became unnervingly aware of how much Michelle Pfeiffer looks like Michael Jackson.
The film does suffer from a multitude of continuity errors however, many of which occur in during the finale. This is due to the fact that Nichols was obviously pressured by the production company to hurry up after the director delayed the film’s release by more than half a year in order to reshoot the latter third of the production. As such, upon impact, metal bars give way under a character’s weight, tines of a pitchfork bend when skewering an actor’s chest, an obvious mannequin is thrown into a staircase, and Laura’s pantyhose continually changes color between alternating shots.
Mike Nichols’s Wolf is a wonderful piece of social commentary which uses the predatory nature of the werewolf as a metaphor for the cutthroat nature of corporate politics. Not alarmingly, Jack Nicholson does an outstanding job, not only in his ability to make a lycanthrope plausible, but in his ability to turn a character a full 180 degrees (in the first third of the feature nonetheless). Ultimately, Wolf stands as yet another sound installment in an already stellar subgenre within the field of horror. As for the feature not being explicitly terrorizing: Anyone who has worked in the corporate sector and has risen above his or her initial position within the business is poignantly aware of the terror that is abound with characters like Stewart waiting around the corner, ready to pounce.
-Egregious Gurnow
- Interview with J.R. Bookwalter - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Andrew J. Rausch - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Rick Popko and Dan West - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Director Stevan Mena (Malevolence) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Screenwriter Jeffery Reddick (Day of the Dead 2007) - January 22, 2015
- Teleconference interview with Mick Garris (Masters of Horror) - January 22, 2015
- A Day at the Morgue with Corri English (Unrest) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Writer/Director Nacho Cerda (The Abandoned, Aftermath) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Actress Thora Birch (Dark Corners, The Hole, American Beauty) - January 22, 2015
- Interview with Actor Jason Behr, Plus Skinwalkers Press Coverage - January 22, 2015
