Monday, September 16, 2024

Wendigo - 2001

 So I am at the library and this is on a shelf and I'm like, "eh whatever, sure" and I grab it.

Wendigo is a early 2000s independent film, starring Patricia Clarkson and Jake Weber.  I put this is in and I'm watching kinda expecting this to be a SyFy adjacent stupid monster movie.  I am always down for a Wendigo movie, I like the creature and I like stupid movies so like, whatthefuck.

But as this movie goes on, I kinda get drawn into the plot and as this approaches an hour and then 75 minutes I'm already guessing, is there no Wendigo in this movie?  And if that is the case, which it is, what's the angle?  The angle is using this interesting backdrop, this mythology to drop a ambiguous element to this "other suspense" movie and then to ask questions.

The other real actual plot involves a family on vacation way out in the middle of the northeast somewhere, and they run into some yokel rednecks who are immediately hostile after the family hits the guys deer with their car.  The awkwardness takes a stronger turn when it turns out this guy is their neighbor, and then when the family finds bullet holes in their house, and then when the neighbor is spying on them.  

The couple's kid finds a weird Wendigo figurine in a store, and opens up the door to this alternate viewpoint, and to cut to the point - yes - there is a Wendigo in here, but always done in a weird way where it is possible or probable that it is a imagined or hallucinated.  The Wendigo itself looks pretty cool and the rest of the movie isn't hinged around it, so it works.

I was not expecting a rather arresting drama film when I rented a movie called Wendigo, but it is definitely more that than a horror.  So therefore, I give it 3?

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Wendigo - 2001

 So I am at the library and this is on a shelf and I'm like, "eh whatever, sure" and I grab it. Wendigo is a early 2000s indep...