In the parlance of 19th Century England, the time and place in which the film is set, “The Wolfman” is a little bit like a mouthful of wooden teeth: Technically it gets the job done, but to even the untrained eye, it’s not a convincing substitute for something real. In an effort to salvage three years of production disputes, delays, bad buzz, and badmouthing from some of its makers, Universal apparently elected to cobble together success out of a pastiche of previous hits, including King Kong, Hulk, The Incredible Hulk, An American Werewolf in London, and only incidentally its iconic 1941 namesake The Wolf Man, in the process eliminating anything resembling coherent storytelling, originality, or even basic technical competency. In other words, congratulations Universal – you made Van Helsing 2.

Anthony Hopkins and Benicio del Toro in "Wolfman"

Benicio del Toro, quite possibly the least likely person ever to go by the name “Larry,” plays Lawrence Talbot, an actor who succumbs to lycanthropy after being bitten by a mysterious creature. Sir Anthony Hopkins plays Lawrence’s father John, and the actor’s disinterest is palpable in every scene in which he appears; apparently the reason you don’t often see his hands on screen is because they’re always just off-camera, parceling out each penny in his no-doubt considerable paycheck. Emily Blunt quivers and heaves to admirable but unnecessary effect as Lawrence’s improbable, poorly written love interest Gwen. And Hugo Weaving plays Inspector Abberline, a slightly less-animated iteration of The Matrix’s indefatigably dry Agent Smith whom we’re not sure whether is the piece’s hero or villain.

Emily Blunt in "Wolfman"

Then again, there’s virtually nothing in the film that’s defined, explained or otherwise justified. If the film’s cold-open murder of a hapless traveler isn’t a vote of no confidence for the subtleties, much less the substance of The Wolfman’s story, then the rest of the film’s crass, annoying and unending jump scares, not to mention its desperate, ineffective shots of special effects that were obviously done and redone several times, are certainly a sign that money rather than creativity or even basic competence were used to solve the production’s myriad problems.

It’s as if Johnston and Co. simply kept throwing trash bags of cash at the screen and then realized that the only way to make all of that mediocre effort worthwhile was to show it in the longest, clearest, least suspenseful or interesting way possible. With the exception of a dog that basically exists to offer a few extra fake shocks during tense moments, all of the rest of the animals, including a bear and a deer, are created digitally, which makes the odd and ineffective fusing of computer generated images and practical effects for the Wolfman look freaking ridiculous.

Finally – which I suspect is the word also used on set in reference to this part of the film – there’s the script. Is it even remotely possible that Universal didn’t know that screenwriters Andrew Kevin Walker and David Self were cribbing shamelessly from the studio’s past films? The Wolfman seems like nothing so much as Hulk, which was a raging monster lurking within a sensitive, helpless soul – who, coincidentally also found himself running along rooftops, fleeing from dogged pursuers, and in Ang Lee’s interpretation, suffering from some pretty devastating daddy issues. There’s even a square-off against another monster where the two gallop toward each other, exploding in violent contact. Then there’s the King Kong similarities, which include his destruction of a passing trolley, and of course his persecution as a misunderstood monster.

The Wolf in "Wolfman"

That is, except for the fact that he is a monster! With one exception, at almost no time in the film is there ever a sign that Lawrence Talbot is a sentient, motivated creature as the wolfman; he kills indiscriminantly, for no discernible purpose other than wanton destruction (which naturally results in a buffet of bloody prosthetics), and once everyone knows that he’s a monster, he becomes the antagonist and their fears are completely legitimate. In which case, who or what are we rooting for? More gory deaths of people we don’t know? The salvation of a sad-sack hero who has no charm or personality? Another homage/tribute to one of the earlier, better films whose creative (but mostly commercial) success inspired The Wolfman?

Rest assured that there are plenty of references and visual cues for werewolf fans, as well as a preponderance of fluids and flying, dismembered body parts. But sometimes all of those delays, changes, reshoots and rumored problems really do mean that a movie is really, really bad, and The Wolfman is a career-ruiner, or it would be if everyone involved hadn’t already found work in the two years since it was originally shot. (That Joe Johnston is set to direct a Captain America movie augurs terrible things for the last mainstream comic adaptation that actually matters.) Ultimately, there isn’t a single thing that works in the film – not the slapdash, half-practical special effects, not the joyless, airless, immobile acting, not even the usually reliable Danny Elfman’s score, which evokes Wojiech Kilar’s music for Coppola’s Dracula and about a hundred other themes without achieving any identity of its own.

The Wolfman clearly devoted most of its production time coming up with ways to tear bodies limb-from-limb and colorfully throw the pieces around on set. It’s a real shame no one ever tried to make a brain among all of those disparate body parts, because even fake gray matter could have made a better movie than this one, since it clearly used none at all.

Rating: 1 out of 5 stars  1 Star out of 5

In Che, an epic two-part film to be released in January, Del Toro plays guerilla revolutionary Ernesto Che Guevara, traditionally identified by the West as Fidel Castro’s Communist bunkmate and all-around subversive scoundrel. It’s a simplistic characterization, aptly dispelled by this admirably agenda-free 258-minute behemoth of a film. That’s nearly four-and-a-half hours, or the amount of time it takes to microwave 65 bags of popcorn. 

The movie does not so much offer a unilateral defense of a controversial personality as it does reveal the humanness of an enigmatic figure identified by most via his iconic silk-screened image on a T-shirt. h caught up with Del Toro after an advance screening of the marathon film at the Mary Pickford Theatre in Hollywood. He was gracious and in good spirits despite the approaching midnight hour when he arrived. 

What would motivate Del Toro to take on such an exhaustive bio pic project? “The story is unique; it’s compelling history,” he says. “As a Latino, you don’t get many roles like this. I was kind of sucked into it. [Director Steven Soderbergh] was the driving force. I did a lot of research and talked to people who actually knew [Guevara]. It’s probably the most ambitious, complicated, and demanding role I’ve ever done. I got pretty freaked out over it. Steven said, ‘It’s impossible to do this—let’s try.’” 

 Che screened with an intermission—it’s actually two separate movies that can be viewed back-to-back or singularly. The first, The Argentine, focuses on the origins of Guevara’s political activism, his participation in the Cuban Revolution, and Castro’s rise to power. The second, Guerilla, spans his migration to Bolivia and his attempt to organize a revolt against the corrupt government there. 

“Steven wanted to spend time in the first movie to get to know Che,” explains Del Toro. “The second part is based on his personal diaries. He succeeded in Cuba, tried the same thing in Bolivia and failed. If you only saw the story about the last year of his life, you’d think he was demented. You’d say, ‘What did he expect?’ We chose two specific events. To make a movie about his whole life would be, like, 11 hours.” 

In addition to consuming enough celluloid to wallpaper the West Wing of Guantanamo, Che is subtitled in English, a caveat to those who reflexively expect cinema to treat world history as an American export. Oddly enough, Soderbergh does not speak Spanish, and Del Toro’s phraseology is, by his own admission, that of a 13-year-old Puerto Rican boy. 

“Che was a scholar,” says Del Toro. “His speech at the U.N. [in 1964 after the Cuban Revolution] is well-known and is quoted throughout South America. I’m not Cuban. I worked hard on the dialect.” 

Del Toro talked with three people who knew Guevara personally and got first-hand accounts that proved invaluable. “We felt a sense of responsibility. We were concerned that no one could say, ‘That didn’t happen.’ Everything in the movie pretty much did happen. People who knew Che all talked about him in a respectful way but not as if he was sacred. He made mistakes. He wasn’t perfect.”

As a freedom fighter waging armed resistance, Guevara’s Achilles’ heel was asthma. There are battle scenes during which his breathing difficulties are so severe, he seems close to death. “I had an asthma attack once. I hallucinated. It’s one of the scariest places to be. The problem with asthma is that your lungs are full of air and you can’t push it out. In order to act that, you have to almost suffocate yourself.” 

Soderbergh, who also directed Del Toro in Traffic, is known to do some of his own camera work. “Steven’s great,” enthuses Del Toro. “He’s like a method director. You experience everything right there. When he says ‘Got it,’ as an actor you feel comfortable. You know he’s in there with you.” 

Having played a collection of unsavory characters—thieves, drug fiends, assassins—Del Toro has learned something from his roles;
to leave each character in the trailer when he goes home. But the experience of making Che left a lasting impression on him. “I’m much more conscious of the history of the Caribbean, the 1960’s, and all the things he talked about and stood for that are still relevant today. I started to write a diary. It’s tough. He wrote every day. I write every month.” As if making a spontaneous effort to rectify the discrepancy, he adds,
“I’m gonna write tonight.”