The Wolf Man (1941)
The Wolf Man is one of those movies that's really impossible to review in the modern era, it's an accepted classic and anyone attempting to review it will either be labeled a sycophant or a contrarian, depending on their views. Regardless, I will throw my uninteresting two cents into the discussion.
The Wolf Man is a very classic film and while it's important to understand it in that context and appreciate what it was to the world at this time, it is a very simple story that isn't nearly as effective as it once was. The werewolf scenes are still very effective, creepy and alarming in spite of the primitive make-up effects that turned Lon Chaney into a pretty goofy looking werewolf.
The movie clocks in at a little over an hour long (including some lengthy credits) yet somehow feels languid in its pacing. Lon Chaney Jr.'s Larry Talbot comes off like a dumb bumpkin which sort of undercut the tragedy of his story and its tendency to call out its themes repeatedly is a bit unnecessary and tiring.
The Wolf Man is a groundbreaking movie and its contributions to the werewolf genre cannot and should not be undersold, but unfortunately its a formula that has been tweaked and improved upon throughout the years. So while the movie is still an impressive piece of work it just doesn't work that well in the modern era.
The Wolfman (2010)
The Wolfman is a ground-up reimagining of the original movie, moving the time period back to the 1890s. Larry Talbot is now Laurence (Benecio Del Toro) and as before he returns to the family estate with his estranged father Sir John (Anthony Hopkins) and is attacked by a werewolf. When the moon turns full, Laurence becomes a werewolf and tears shit up. Meanwhile Gwen (Emily Blunt), Laurence's late brother's fiance seeks to cure Laurence of his lupine curse before he kills again.
Is it a good remake?
That really depends on what you're looking for. The Wolfman is clearly a passion project and an attempt to make a movie that really expands on what the original must have felt like to the people who saw it at the time.
The werewolf scenes are brutally violent and filled with gore gags, the make-up is mostly practical but there is a lot of noticeable CG stuff that was studio mandated and against the wishes of the effects department. There is a valiant attempt to update the classic Wolf Man look that mostly works, though it can never quite overcome the fact that the Wolf Man just looks like a weird ape.
The movie has a deadly serious tone but the pacing of the werewolf scenes and the gore gags has a more arch feeling to it, more akin to Tim Burton's Sleepy Hollow than the spooky period horror film the movie seems to try to be evoking. Nowhere is this more out of place than the pro-wrestling caliber werewolf smack-down at the film's climax.
I do think that that anyone who's particularly reverent of the original will probably hate this version but if you can get on its wavelength it does build on the concepts and ideas in the original in ways that 70% work.
Does it stand on its own?
No, but also yes. As I've said, this thing is tonally all-over the place and there's no reason that this movie needs to be nearly two hours long. The movie is packed with big, long set-pieces that really sell the spectacle of the wolfman but that's always to the film's detriment. Did the movie really need to rip off two of the most memorable scenes from An American Werewolf in London? I don’t thin it did.
As impressive and fun as the gore is, it stands opposite of the original movie's intimate horror. Horror doesn't need to be epic and this particular horror story is far too stripped down to be stretched out in the way of this re-imagining. As with Francis Ford Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula and Kenneth Branagh's Mary Shelly's Frankenstein, Joe Johnston's The Wolfman is far too impressed with the smell of its own farts to curb its weaknesses and embrace its strengths.
With that said, The Wolfman is a movie of many great moments and those great moments may not add up to the masterpiece that the film-makers envisioned but it is extremely watchable and I'll even tentatively say, pretty good. Go in with an open mind understanding that this is going to be long and that it's going to be a little sillier than it realizes and I think you'll enjoy your experience.
Watch, Toss, or Buy?
This is a soft buy.