Tag: low budget

Howl (2015)

Posted on by fenrisfil

Britain has strong ties with Werewolf movies. The movie that established the rules of on screen lycanthropy was “Werewolf of London” (1935). The movie often regarded as the best Werewolf movie of all time is “American Werewolf in London” (1981), set in London and a co-production. If I was to list a top five Werewolf movies I’d definitely include American Werewolf, but I’d also likely add “Dog Soldiers” (2002) and “In The Company of Wolves” (1984). It’s safe to say we can make a decent Werewolf movie in the UK. So naturally I wanted to give “Howl” a chance. The movie is directed by Paul Hyett and written by Mark Huckerby and Nick Ostler. Cinematography is by Adam Biddle and Music is by Paul E. Francis. The movie cost a mere $1.9m to make.

The movie follows “Joe Griffin” (Ed Speleers), a train guard on a double shift working an overnight passenger train from London Waterloo to “Eastborough” (A fictional destination). “Joe” has a romantic interest in another member of the crew, “Ellen” (Holly Weston), who runs the tea trolley. A little way from their destination when passing through some dense forest the train hits a deer and the driver (Sean Pertwee) makes an emergency stop to assess the situation. However he is attacked by some kind of creature and killed. Hearing the driver is missing and rail company can’t send help out for four hours the passengers decide to walk to the next station, but they too are attacked. Trapped back in the train carriage the mismatched group of strangers must try and survive the night.

Dog Veteran

So first thing to note here is the disappointment at Sean Pertwee’s painfully brief cameo. Sean of course was one of the main actors in 2002’s Dog Soldiers, so it’s not his first time being eaten by a Werewolf. An underrated actor and one who is well known by fans of the genre, so it feels a real waste to have him as the first person killed. His screen time was two and a half minutes. Still, the budget for this movie is so low they probably couldn’t afford to have him star. It’s worth noting Dog Soldiers cost $2.3m and came out 13 years earlier, so this is on an even tighter budget. Fortunately the rest of the cast are fairly solid (Being the usual mix of TV actors you tend to get at this budget point).

The Werewolves in this movie are somewhat unique. More human that usual. Not even going the “Wolfman” approach, but instead remaining mostly human outside of the legs and face. Interesting to note here, the effects are a hybrid between practical and CGI. It’s not layered though, it’s half and half. The legs are CGI and the facial changes are practical effects. The result actually worked quite well in the movie. Personally though, I prefer my werewolves to look more wolf like (In the traditional hybrid style). But this variation did fit the film, so that is fine. As original takes on the design go, it’s actually one of the better ones. Certainly better than that last “Wolfman” movie.

Conclusion

This is a simple concept with a straight forward execution. That can be fine, but it puts more weight on the other elements to deliver. There is a vague attempt at putting some social commentary into it, but it’s a bit clumsy. The commentary relies entirely on the background of the passengers and them basically telling you who they are. Often the film seems to be flailing around desperately trying to say something but not quite sure what it is. Outside of that, the characters are reasonable and have a bit of variety. That said, I occasionally mixed up “Ed Speleers” Joe with Sam Gittin’s “Billy”. The action/violence when it happens is done pretty well, especially considering the budget.

This is a pretty basic Werewolf movie, with an interesting design and well made for the restrictions of the production budget. It doesn’t really do much to stand out, outside of that unique werewolf design and that may be a negative for some people anyway. This is a firm 5.5/10. If you are a fan of the sub-genre then it’s probably worth the watch, but it’s not likely to make anyone’s top ten.

Rating: 5.5 out of 10.

Crime Wave (1953)

Posted on by fenrisfil

For my penultimate November Noir this year I’m checking out the very low budget B-Movie Noir “Crime Wave” from 1953 (1954 for the US). This is from director André De Toth (Pitfall) with a screenplay from Crane Wilbur. The movie stars Gene Nelson, with support from Phyllis Kirk, Sterling Hayden, Ted de Corsia and an early role for Charles Bronson (Credited as Charles Buchinsky, since it is before he changed his name). Sterling Hayden as the biggest star at the time got top billing despite his supporting role. Hayden would of course become an even bigger name in the years to come with films like “The Killers”, “Doctor Strangelove” and “The Godfather”.

Cops and Robbers.

“Steve Lacey” (Nelson), is an ex-con that has gone straight. He has settled down with his lovely wife “Ellen” (Kirk) and holds a pretty decent job despite his record. However, people who knew from his days of crime or his days in prison regularly hassle him and he struggles to truly escape his past. “Gat Morgan” (Nedrick Young) comes crashing into this, injured after he and two others were involved in a shoot-out with the police. Lacey refuses to get involved, but the wounds cause the man to die. The doctor Morgan had called arrives too late, but takes his pay out of the criminals suit before leaving.

Enter detective Simms (Hayden), a hard-nosed lieutenant that seems to have Lacey in his sights, assuming he will try and help his former convict friends, he sweats Lacey for three days in jail but eventually lets him loose. On returning home, the con finds ‘Doc’ Penny (de Corsia) and Ben Hastings (Bronson), his former colleagues, have invaded his apartment. Not only do they intend to hide out at Lacey’s they also want him to be their getaway driver for an ambitious bank job. With his wife as hostage he doesn’t have any choice but to cooperate.

Beating The Budget.

As I said in the introduction, this is a shoestring noir and so it’s not surprising there are times this is very noticable in the film. Two occasions in particular had horrendous dialogue delivery from a couple of bad actors, but both were minor characters and were easy to ignore not matter how obviously they are trying to remember their lines and speak them at the same time. It’s worth noting with low budget movies like this, there isn’t the luxury to reshoot every scene 100 times to make sure the take is spot on. So the acting may not be much worse than on a bigger budget movie, but there is no covering it up here. Even Sterling Hayden has a scene where the dialogue felt wrong in it’s delivery. Not actually bad like the other two events, but notably lacking the sleek delivery of the majority of his lines.

The cheapness isn’t all bad though. In many ways it makes the crime drama feel grittier and more realistic. It’s possibly the earliest film I’ve seen with something akin to “Shaky Cam” footage. Especially of note is the filming from inside vehicles, which really feels like a camera stuffed inside an actual car. It appears that they shot all the car footage on location, not using green screens. Indeed the final car chase actually follows a legitimate car route between the locations. One of the strengths of the film is how it utilizes heavy location filming with these more mobile camera techniques. They used a lot of genuine locations, and some, such as the veterinary practice, are still standing today (albeit with a different name). All told, I think they actually turned the lower budget into something positive here, and the film alone is worthy of praise for that.

Life And The City.

The characters are fairly one dimensional, even Steve Lacey who is a victim of circumstances for the entire movie. His more heroic actions aren’t the result of inner turmoil like was in the case of Dana Andrews character in “Where the Sidewalk Ends”, instead it’s just Lacey being Lacey. From the very start he’s firm in not wanting to have anything to do with the gang, but is forced to take part due to them using his wife as a hostage. Detective Lt. Simms is a very standard Haydn detective character. Hard-nosed, authoritative… frankly a bit of a dick, but unlike Haydn’s character in The Godfather he’s not corrupt and so ultimately figures out who are the criminals and who is the victim. This is played more as a heartwarming moment for the protagonist and his wife instead of a character moment for Simms. It does achieve what it was going for though, giving the movie a somewhat upbeat ending.

The story itself is straightforward, but compelling. It’s a classic noir in that regard, an ex con whose past is catching up to him. A character dragged into events, with seemingly no control of their own fate. This definitely provides the fatalism you expect in noir. The heavy use of location filming and the way way of presenting the city itself almost like a character is all part of the package of 50’s noir. Because of the guerrilla like filming style we get a bit of an unexpected visual treat with this in how authentic the city feels. This is the city as it is, the buildings in their naked stone… the people without makeup. That line is from “The Naked City” (1948), but as good as that movie was, this feels more authentic.

Conclusion

This is an interesting noir. It’s not the best plot, it’s not the best characters and it’s not got the best cinematography or soundtrack. But what it does have is buckets of creativity applied to making an effective film on a shoestring budget. To be fair, the rest is perfectly adequate and would probably land this film with a narrow 6/10. However, the uniqueness of this, the cleverness of how it deals with the budget restraints and the gritty feel all boost that up to a strong 6.5/10. Well worth checking out.

Rating: 6.5 out of 10.