The Company of Wolves

Worth seeing for the atmosphere and visuals, but the disjointed script needed a few more drafts. More of a dark fantasy than a horror, though it does boast a fantastically disturbing werewolf transformation scene early on. Ending was a big WTF.

Anthology film, framed with a fable story, all dreamt by a modern day girl. Makes me ask: Why? The modern day bookends serve absolutely no purpose, and the RRH story is cool on its own, but is destroyed by the constant interruptions. The interspersed stories are a mixed bag, but all of them fare worse because of the framing devices that draw attention away from the content. There's no real payoff for this construction, and while the content is ok it's nowhere near special enough to overcome it.

It's a magical bag full of SOMETHING, that's for sure.

A series of visually striking but otherwise vapid variations on the venerable Little Red Riding Hood Meets the Wolf Man myth, this plays like a classy Hammer period piece gone pretentious. While Lansbury is effective as the archetypal eccentric Granny and Patterson is appropriately fetching as Little Red (herein redubbed Rosaleen), Jordan's Freudian fright mosaic left yours truly longing for Maria Ouspenskaya and Lon Chaney, Jr.

If Neil Jordan's mind was a corner of the internet, it would be a place I would tread lightly.

It kept threatening to transcend the silliness, and then some ridiculous thing would happen or another terrible set would appear and I just couldn't deal with it. Jordan's work in the editing room is quite good, and I liked the convoluted, heavily folded narrative. But it was just so, so silly, and not in an entertaining way, sadly. The wolves/dogs gave the best performances in the whole movie.

Interesting, if not entirely successful take on the Red Riding Hood yarn. The set design is imaginative but suffers from looking very much like a stage set - still, it has more appeal than the CGI nonsense of the recent Alice in Wonderland films. The knowing performances, particularly from the likeable Lansbury, work well, but the script feels a bit light and the modern-day framing device feels superfluous. There's enough to like to make it worth watching, but it feels a bit half-baked.

A bizarre and sporadically eerie, but ever muddled, camp spin on Red Riding Hood by unconventional Irish writer-filmmaker Neil Jordan, featuring probably the cheapest, and most adorable, werewolves one could imagine.

Probably the best adaptation of Little Red Riding Hood I've seen, for what it's worth.

Jumbled variation and derivation of Little Red Riding Hood would get a pass for its wonderfully theatrical and stagey set design alone, which gives the film an eerie, other-worldly quality; the practical werewolf effects are not as polished as CGI effects, but do much to add to the folkloric atmosphere. Performers are variable, with Lansbury stealing it as the slightly demented tale-spinning Granny, though Patterson is about as good an incarnation of purefied innocence as you could hope for.

This film being rated 18 (at least where I'm from) is a complete goof since it's a story clearly aimed at teenagers. Very messy and disjointed plot-wise but works wonderfully as a deconstruction of classic fairy tales and their socially conservative function. The wonderful design & tone perfectly add to this post-modern angle and the flashes of horror and surreal imagery are just delightful. To me the many flaws of this film are easy to overlook due to thematic coherence & alluring atmosphere.

Bizarre and preposterous in more or less equal measure - but (just about) saved by its visuals. The poster art is among my all-time favorites.

Classic tale of Little Red Riding Hood gets adult treatment and becomes a film about sexual awakening and woman's coming of age. Lots of rich metaphors makes it even too obvious. Film is based on story of feminist writer, so the fact that almost every man in the film is sexual beast - werewolf comes as no surprise. Visual effects are scary and well made. Art direction is good too, but somehow film feels like something made for TV.

surreal, dreamlike, narratively loose journey of a young woman's sexual awakening.I was sold on the fairy tale aesthetic of the set design. The villages and woods spring to life like a vibrant, enchanted storybook. I'm a caveman, so themes and metaphors are lost on me but me like pretty pictures this movie pretty. paced quite well and enough thread to follow that I floated along with the movie, enjoying its strange twilight state.gory, skin shedding werewolf transformation was fabulous!

Some truly haunting images in this adult version of Red Riding Hood.

Tiresome. Given its structure I thought it came from an anthology but it's based on a short story. Starts w/ a 5 minute dream sequence letting us know via pretentious metaphor that childhood is no longer a safe haven for a girl we know nothing about; followed by a 15 minute tale about other people. Eventually we get a (thankfully) pretty lead to follow as we hear more stories. It repeatedly beats the same feminist drum: men are wolves. Women can be too, but good ones. Efx suck compared to AWIL.

Jim Henson presents An American Werewolf in London. What it lacks in narrative logic it makes up for in atmosphere and awesomely 80's set design.

Neil Jordan's second film, a dark fantasy based on the tales of Angela Carter. Fantastic. [Re-watched 16/11/2016]

Terrible acting and dialogue together with interesting visuals. The story could've been saved by a good story and direction but unfortunately both of those were sub par too.

Valid as a forgotten warewolf flick from the 80's, yet somehow it's eccentricities leave a strange taste in the mouth. Lansbury's character is bizzare, but I think that's the intent, and the blatant sexuality of this movie kind of just pushes it over the limit--especially because of Lansbury's mere presence. I will admit, though, that it had some decent scary parts.

It's basically Little Red Riding Hood. Pretty creepy tone throughout and a great beauty in the lead.

Hey Neil Jordan, Tim Burton called. He wants his kooky gothic imagery back.

Interesting adaptation. The symbolism is even less subtle than in the book, but subtlety isn't a virtue in itself and obviously wasn't the point here.

The "Little Red Riding Hood" elements and the werewolf elements never really seem to gel

"Classic tale of Little Red Riding Hood gets adult treatment and becomes a film about sexual awakening and woman's coming of age. "

Very strange film.

Ambiguous narrative. Bulldozer metaphors. Hokey effects. Victorian era. Sign. Me. Up. NOT!

Mediocrity of a film. Watched it 'cause I found it in a list amongst the horror films worth seeing for their setting and art-side, but ah well, here comes the disappointment. Plain mediocre acting, plain mediocre stories, flat characters... I found the B-movies sort of special effects being the most amusing part of the film!

I vividly remember the freaky VHS box art at the rental store when I was a kid, nestled in between Chopping Mall and Creepshow. I've finally watched it and, unlike most other 80s horror, that cover is an accurate frigging depiction of what's in the movie. It's not particularly good and seems to clumsily meander for much of the running time, but is worth seeing for the production design, cinematography, and the often great/sometimes hilariously silly practical effects alone.

Adult fairy tale.

Really obscure, laughable at points. Kinda intriguing as a red riding hood story. Needed something else.

Good

4/5

The story was told in an unconvincing way and looked like it was shot in some dodgy underground studio.

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The frequently inspiring set design doesn't really make up for the atrocious acting or the fact that this is an awkward anthology about wolves rather than a full length movie. Yeah, there's the occasionally interesting bit of symbolism, but it's ultimately underwhelming amid the back and forth meta-storytelling. This felt a lot longer than its standard hour and a half runtime. Black Moon is a much better, more interesting dive into many of the same themes.

Vincent Company

72.000

7+

I like it. Worth a watch if you want to see an adult version of Little Red Riding Hood.