Having already tackled one of the biggest villains in Universal Studio’s Mount Rushmore of Monsters, Leigh Whannell (The Invisible Man, 2020) returns to battle the beast in Wolf Man (2025). Remaking a classic is never an easy task but, as with Robert Eggers’ Nosferatu (2024) and really any picture that’s has been worked and re-worked so many times, it’s less about the painting itself and more about how the artist decides to fill the space inside the lines. For better or worse, Whannell and co-writer Corbett Tuck find new ground to recontextualize the classic story for a modern audience, using themes and motifs from the contemporary horror playbook in an attempt to make these monsters of yesteryear feel universal once more.Â
Wolf Man (2025) stars Julia Garner (Apartment 7A) and Christopher Abbott (Possessor) as Blake & Charlotte, a couple on the verge of collapse. In an attempt to rekindle the fire of their family bond, they set out with their young daughter (Matilda Firth) to spend a summer in the foothills of Oregon while Blake clears out the home of his missing-and-presumed-dead father Grady (Sam Jaeger). On route, the family is attacked by a creature and Blake slowly transforms into something more animal than man. Dun, Dun Dunnnnn! It’s a werewolf movie. You know the score.
“Wolf Man (2025)Â tries hard to distinguish itself from the countless werewolf movies that have come before it, but never quite figures out exactly what it wants to be.
Along the way, we’re treated to some fun werewolf POV that gives a first-hand glimpse at Blake’s experience. The werewolf curse comes over him like a disease that slowly strips away his ability to speak or understand Charlotte when she talks to him. His teeth fall out and his senses heighten while his skin practically melts away and he becomes more dog like. Comparisons to David Cronenberg’s The Fly (1986) are definitely warranted, but the nuance of what Whannell and Tuck are trying to communicate with the prolonged transformation never quite comes across.Â
Blake‘s fears of becoming a psychologically abusive father and Charlotte‘s concern that she’ll lose Blake (and by extension, her daughter as well) are told to us, but the groundwork for those arcs is lost in the shuffle. Worse than that, they aren’t even lost because the movie is too busy serving up dynamite fights and frights. Wolf Man is a tedious exploration of middle-aged worries wrapped up in a werewolf movie, with both sides of that silver coin completely rusted and dull.Â
“…a tedious exploration of middle-aged worries wrapped up in a werewolf movie.“
Wolf Man (2025) tries hard to distinguish itself from the countless werewolf movies that have come before it, but never quite figures out exactly what it wants to be. It’s a Body Horror spin on the terror of transformation, an overwrought tale of loss and toxic fathers (see: Grief), and a folk horror spin on the lycanthrope curse. The movie checks a lot of boxes for horror fans, sight-unseen, but it fails to deliver much in the way of scares or story. Wolf Man‘s best moments are in the creative flourishes that Whannell and co-writer Corbett Tuck add during its transformation chunk, but a curiously unscary twist on a classic story that has served as the template for an entire subgenre.
Leigh Whannell’s Wolf Man (2025) is in theatres now! Let us know what you thought of this new re-imaging, and all about your favorite werewolf movies, over in the official Nightmare on Film Street Discord! It’s better than X, easier than Instagram, and it’s where all the cool creeps are hanging out.
