Welcome to the wholly accidental Werewolf Week at Movieline, a fluke of timing in which we've become something of a repository for lycanthropian studies. You've seen the bad, and you've seen the awkward -- now see the mostly good as The Wolfman rebounds from its heavy gothic roots to a sleeker, more sinewy rock 'n' roll beast. (Alas, we can't do anything about Anthony Hopkins' cliches.)
The big, lugubrious period trappings of the original Wolfman trailer now take a back seat to the title character himself, whose man-to-beast transition was glimpsed previously but now works more aggressively as The Big Sell. As it should: Benicio Del Toro's features are dramatically worked over here, relegating Wolfman's romance/family/wolf-hunter subplots to the fringe where -- let's face it -- they belong. Though you do get Emily Blunt's naked back and a fabulously decrepit Hopkins muttering platitudes between 1,000-yard-stares, so don't think director Joe Johnston has sacrificed all dynamics for finger-bending, skull-contorting FX. Whether this is a reaction to yesterday's New Moon clip or simply the new Universal regime aggressively slamming its marketing cards on the table for the first time, all that matters is: We have a winner.
VERDICT: Sold!
[via /film]