Author: Angela Quinton

When I asked folks on Twitter to let me know about any upcoming werewolf movies missing from my list, Full Moon Features writer Craig J. Clark sent in a link to Good Manners (“As Boas Maneiras” in its native Portuguese), a 2017 horror drama from writer / director team Marco Dutra and Juliana Rojas.

The film tells the story of Clara, a nurse from a São Paulo favela, who finds herself the adoptive mother of a werewolf child after his mother dies giving birth to him under a full moon. And that’s just the first act!

Reviews so far are unanimously positive. The Hollywood Reporter described it as “a hybrid of art house and genre cinema [that combines] sharp social commentary with grand guignol fantasy”.

The synopses, the reviews and even the poster position this as the sort of story I want more of – lycanthropy is integral to the story, but not necessarily the subject of the story.

I don’t read Portuguese so it’s hard for me to be sure, but I think Good Manners is currently in what I like to call “international festival limbo”. It screened at a variety of South American festivals in 2017, but it doesn’t yet seem to be slated for any 2018 appearances, and there are no details regarding international distribution. Keep an eye out for purchase / rental links here when that latter bit changes.

Edit: Indiana University Cinema has screenings scheduled for January 25th and 26th, if you can make it to Bloomington.

Further edit: Writer / director Marco Dutra commented on this very post to confirm the film had two US festival appearances, and that more are on the way!

In the meantime, here are some promo photos and a trailer. This film looks gorgeous and I can’t wait for it to traumatize me!

Whatever you might say about its production values or its gratuitous fetish content (“Who’s afraid of the big slimy wolf?” sounds like a writing prompt for a very DeviantArt sort of short story), writer / director / actor Sébastien Godin‘s upcoming film Lycanimator certainly looks fresh as hell. I spy that one werewolf mask everyone’s using in their low-budget werewolf movies, but it gets remixed into a horrific neon nightmare of ooze and incredibly long claws. Dread Central has the exclusive trailer (or watch it below) and more credits. Keep an eye on its Facebook page and its Werewolf Movies entry for release dates.

Writer/director Simon Wells‘s low-budget feature film is now available for purchase States-size from Amazon and Google Play. It stars Atlanta Johnson and Ben Loyd Holmes  (who also produced), plus this wooly, beady-eyed werewolf.

“Whilst trying to reignite their relationship at a remote cottage,” the promo copy reads, “Dave and Abi are stalked by a terrifying secret.”

I searched the trailer for hints as to what the secret could be, since the presence of a werewolf is right there in the title. Here’s my guess: the secret is that the poster art bears no relation whatsoever to the content of the film, which does not take place in London, and which seems like a thin story wrapped around excuses to have Johnson scream very loudly and show a fit Holmes with his shirt off.

Conduct your own investigation with the trailer here:

Edit 2018-01-06: the Vimeo link was password protected for a few days in December, but it seems to be public again.

Werewolf short film “Transitions” was an Official Selection in the 2017 Bleedingham Horror Short Film Festival, and it won four awards, including Best Special Effects and a respectable 3rd Place in Cinematography. Congratulations to director Eddie Hayes and the rest of the folks involved! This was a great little short with some nice transformation effects, although the werewolf could’ve used a wet wipe and I feel like there could have been two howls at the end.

I can’t find any information about the status of director Matt Oates‘s action/horror film “Bitch” (its absence on his kind-of broken web site doesn’t bode well), but Digital Frontier FX did an excellent job on the creature design and execution in the trailer pitch. It’s nice to see a long take of a shadowy werewolf lit just well enough to show off some of its eerily human features, like its (her?) hands.

From ComingSoon.net comes news that Max Landis, son of American Werewolf in London writer / director John Landis, is making some changes to the storyline presented in the original film.

A fan posed a question to Landis about a sequence in the original film, specifically about the village of East Proctor, its citizens, why they didn’t attempt to stop the werewolf before the events of the film, and whether they knew him as a person or not. Landis replied:

“Answering this question and the nature of the village’s role in the plot in the second and third act as of now are the biggest changes I’ve made to the original structure… I always wondered about that Pentagram. Doing some fun stuff.”

Say what you want about the guy (and plenty have), but he does take writing seriously. I don’t have any expectations for this remake so there’s nothing to crush.