Game of Werewolves

source: Game of Werewolves

If this film had been signed by Blake Edwards, Wilder or Polanski, and it had been shot in English in a lost village in Romania, instead of Juan Martínez having shot it in Spanish around Santiago de Compostela, we would be talking about a masterpiece. Thanks so much to Juan Martínez.

I watched this twice ~ when it was released and again, now after 9 years. Still laughed as loud as I did the first time round. The characters were a bunch of bumbling fools, but the type that you kept rooting for to survive. Some good scares and gore but in done in a good B-movie way. Great popcorn movie, and a nice way to enjoy the evening. Definitely worth the rental.

Foreign horror - it's always somewhat less regarded against the Hollywood machine and yet when we think of films from other shores there's a recurring theme: they are, for the most part, FANTASTIC. And thankfully are growing an ever faithful audience. Whether it be a comedy horror, a splatter fest or an hardcore horror there's something for everyone. Werewolf films, certainly good ones are not always easy to find and Game of is easily one of the best, beautifully fusing humour and horror into one. Synopsis: After 15 years, Tomas, a not very successful writer, comes back to the village in Galicia where his family comes from, Arga, apparently to get an award. But he doesn't know the real reason why he is there, until it's too late... Immediately what springs to mind is that the three main characters: Gorka Otxoa, Carlos Areces and Secun de la Rosa are fun, interesting warm characters with heart and soul. A rarity since some characters in horror you delight in their grisly deaths - These guys aren't those. As funny as they are, clearly there's a real bond between the actors/ characters that comes through and makes them joyful to watch. Equally the setting of the film based in one small place means there is ample opportunity to create long dark spaces, dimly lit chambers with golden candlelight as a guide and atmospherical surroundings. All of which are done to blistering swell effect, Speaking of effect/s I'd be remiss to forget the creature make up. How nice it is to see largely practical effects. Yes I don't mind CGI but there's something altogether more charming about practical old school effects, sure there's some CGI but it's really not that noticeable I feel. The humour is fantastic, there's so many moments that are laugh out loud; the finger scene is ridiculously funny and it never tries too hard to make us laughing coming across with a natural flair. And it must be said the final twist is a fun howler! I dislike reviews comparing this to Shaun of the Dead this is both different and interesting without the need for comparisons. Want a good werewolf flick? Check this out and as far as foreign horror goes this is an hilariously Spanish jab at the werewolf sub genre.

"Lobos de Arga" A slow starter but well worth the investment, this Spanish film is "Shaun of the Dead" meets "Wolfman" and doesn't fail to deliver. Don't be put off by the subtitles because the narrative and acting in this is great, very tongue in cheek and dead pan at times but thoroughly enjoyable, you won't need to be a foreign film fan to be able to enjoy this. 100 years after a curse a young writer travels back home to the village of Agra, where he intends to pick up an award and the freedom of the village. Tomás is the writer who thinks he is to be honoured when in fact he is the direct descendant of the werewolf curse. The truth is the that villagers intend to use him to end the century old curse. Can Tomás escape or will the werewolf curse prove to be the alpha ingredient to total blood lust and carnage? Plenty of black humour, plenty of blood and guts, nods to famous horror classics, lots of fun, definitely worth a watch.

The death of Paul Naschy in 2009 marked the end of an era for fans of Spanish horror; no longer would legendary lycanthrope Waldemar Daninsky prowl the countryside terrorising simple villagers. Still, it would be just a mere two years before the Spanish hills were alive again with the sound of howling, director Juan Martínez Moreno's 2011 comedy/horror Attack of the Werewolves delivering not just one baying beast, but a whole slew of slavering hairy horrors ready to rip unwary Iberians to shreds. Gorka Otxoa stars as writer Tomás Mariño, who is lured back to his childhood village of Arga by desperate locals hoping to break the 100-year-old curse that has seen them plagued by a ravenous werewolf. By sacrificing Tomas, a direct descendant of the woman who incited the curse, they hope to end the monster's reign of terror, but their plan backfires, resulting in an even worse curse befalling them. With the balance tipped more in the favour of comedy than horror, this one might not be best suited to those seeking a truly terrifying time, especially considering the rather long wait before the first werewolf makes an appearance. Fortunately, there are just about enough decent laughs to keep matters trundling along until the werewolfery kicks in, after which the fun really begins, with a narrow escape from a tunnel via the use of a decaying corpse, a very amusing scene involving severed fingers and a hungry dog, and a great finale which features numerous leaping werewolves (these are extremely athletic monsters) and a smattering of gore. 6.5 out of 10, rounded up to 7 for IMDb.

As you can probably tell from my title, I loved this movie. People have described it as Spain's answer to Shaun of the Dead. This is fairly accurate as far as the entertainment quota goes, and its about as scary as Shaun of the Dead too (1), but the plot not a SOTD rip off. Calling it SOTD only with werewolves is lazy. It deserves to be discussed on it's own merits. The movie is subtitled which, while never being ideal, doesn't ruin the fun(2). There are a lot of laugh out laugh moments which tells you that is it a genuinely funny script. The characters are great fun and nicely rounded(3). The humour is a bit school boyish, but that never stopped The Young Ones or The Inbetweeners being a hit did it. There's even a plucky pet dog who gets a lot of action and earns a couple of belly laughs. The werewolves are possibly a tiny bit too "man in fluffy costume" but I admire the director's take on FX vs CGI. Would a CGI werewolf been any better??? No. I very much doubt they had a Lord of The Rings style CGI budget to blow on this movie. Anyway, this movie isn't really about the horror, its an "badult" comedy adventure. Another minor problem could be the lack of a sexy heroine, but to be honest there are plenty of pure comedic genius moments to take your mind of that(4) and lets face it she'd have been wasted on us non Spanish speakers because we'd be too busy reading the subtitles! All told, Lobos de Arga well worth blowing 90 minutes in front of the TV and I'm planning on getting the DVD (5) too. Enjoy yourself, this movie certainly gets my seal of approval. (1) - Shaun of the Dead was not Scary. It was a total laugh though. So is Lobos De Arga! (2) - I want to watch a movie. Not miss it while reading the script! Dubbing is an under-rated tool that allows the viewer to revel in the production values of the movie - kinda important if its a horror movie! Lobos De Arga has scenes in old churches and underground tunnels which I loved to check out the scenery but I'm stuck reading the script, admittedly a very funny script but come on! I want my cake and I wanna eat it! (3) - Look out for the hamster joke! (4) - The dutch Horror comedy Kill Zombie! did have a super sexy kick ass heroine. I quite liked Kill Zombie! BUT Lobos De Arga knocks it out of the park as far fun goes. (5) - Is there a blu ray version? Highly unlikely is my guess, more is the pity!

The sub-genre known as the horror-comedy is one that, to say the very least, has produced quite a lot of uneven films. Most often, the horror is diluted by the comedy or the laughs are too lame. Every so often, though, a movie comes along which gets the balance just right. Attack of the Werewolves is such a film. It begins quite excellently, with a voice over giving us the historical back-story over a series of very beautiful drawings. After that we are right into the story about a writer who returns to his ancestral family village only to discover a curse involving bloodthirsty werewolves. This really is a skillful mix of frights and laughs. The former is provided by the title monsters, helped by some nice atmosphere and tension. The latter is provided by a genuinely amusing script with several funny lines and additionally some hilarious sight gags – in particular, look out for the finger/dog scene. The cast all acquit themselves very well, the only one I recognised was Carlos Areces who played the writers old friend, I last seen him play the Sad Clown in the insane comedy The Last Circus from cult director Álex de la Iglesia. This is overall a very refreshingly good film about a traditional monster type. It deserves far more people to see it.

Alright, well Spanish director Juan Martínez Moreno comes out of nowhere with this movie and totally breathes life into an otherwise stale werewolf genre. Don't let the fact that "Lobos de Arga" is a Spanish werewolf movie throw you off, because this movie is awesome. Just as what "Shaun of the Dead" was to the zombie genre and "Lesbian Vampire Killers" was to the vampire genre, then "Lobos de Arga" steps up and puts a much needed comedy twist to the genre. "Lobos de Arga" is the story about Tomás Mariño (played by Gorka Otxoa) who travels to his old childhood village, thinking he is about to be celebrated for his slight fame as an author. Little does he know that the village is plagued by a hundred year old curse where a werewolf is rampart, and that his bloodline is needed to end the curse. The story was actually good and managed to incorporate enough comedy without it turning into a laugh-fest. And the amount of comedy that was here was used at all the right places, with funny comments, funny events and effects. As for the people hired for the various roles, then I will say that people did surprisingly good jobs with their given roles and characters. And there was a lot of cool and interesting details to the characters and much witty banter in the dialogue. The effects in the movie were really great as well, and the werewolves looked really cool. Even the transformation scenes were great, despite being a bit 'simplistic' by today's possibilities of CGI effects. But it worked out well, because it had that late 1980's werewolf transformation feel to it. And it was just right on the money. Being a Spanish movie, of course the dialogue is in Spanish, but it shouldn't be a thing to scare away the audience, because they will lack out on a great movie. "Lobos de Arga" is a great movie that you owe to yourself to watch, especially if you enjoy werewolf movies, and/or enjoyed "Shaun of the Dead" or "Lesbian Vampire Killers". This movie gets a 7 out of 10 rating from me. You shouldn't be missing out on this particular Spanish gem.

I'm a big fan of horror comedy since I first saw Young Frankenstein. This movie is not quite as funny as Pirannah 3DD, and not as badass, just because seeing Ving Rhames say "I ain't scared of no punkass water," or "BRING ME MY LEGS!" just puts a movie on the HNL of badassery; but it has a plot and dialogue that makes it entertaining enough. Contrasting that to the one Hollywood alternative that has a werewolf in it, which is the Twilight quadrupleogy? Is that what you call it when you make a trilogy into four movies to sell more tickets? Anyways, I have seen this movie panned for the special effects; but I've seen films such as Exorcist: The Beginning, that had a much larger budget and spent a great deal of it on really crappy CGI. The werewolves look just fine as monsters to me, and the wire work was decent. If I were the producer/director,with a few millions more in the budget, I could have made a movie with better production value, and even a better aesthetic (like making the werewolves more wolfish; but faulting a director for not having enough money is not his fault. The unemployment rate in Spain right now is so high, that it amazes me an armed revolution has not taken place yet over there, and obviously working in film production must not be easy, and like seriously, I know a couple of girls that are Twilight fans, and they both told me Breaking Dawn part 2 sucked). Still, this film was very engaging and interesting story, so much so, that you will tend to forgive the plot holes.