CURSE OF WOLF MOUNTAIN movie poster | ©2023 Uncork’d Entertainment

CURSE OF WOLF MOUNTAIN movie poster | ©2023 Uncork’d Entertainment

Rating: Not Rated
Stars: Keli Price, Karissa Lee Staples, David Lipper, Malu Trevejo, Matt Rife, Fernanda Romero, Eddie McClintock, Kenny Yates, Kipp Tribble, Amaris Davidson, Abdelhameed “Dooley” Ibrahim, Tobin Bell, Danny Trejo
Writer: Keli Price
Director: David Lipper
Distributor: Uncork’d Entertainment
Release Date: May 9, 2023

The first thing it’s important to know about CURSE OF WOLF MOUNTAIN (at least, for the werewolf movie completionists among us) is that it is not a werewolf movie. Instead, director David Lipper and writer Keli Price ambitiously combine a slasher format with emotional drama.

CURSE OF WOLF MOUNTAIN also causes one to reflect on how hard it is to actually make a good movie. Obviously, it takes more than an ambitious premise. The filmmakers here have secured some strong cast members (along with some weaker ones) and a location that suits their purposes of isolation, camouflage and plenty of space.

In the mountains of Southern California, a couple beg for their lives from an unseen threat, then fall or jump to their deaths.

Twenty years later, the couple’s now-grown son A.J. (writer Price) is working with a hypnotherapist (Tobin Bell) to try to remember exactly what he witnessed when his parents died. The memories are just not coming, so the hypnotherapist suggests that A.J. return to Wolf Mountain, where the incident occurred.

A.J. initially plans to go alone, but his newly-pregnant wife Sam (Karissa Lee Staples), his older brother Max (director Lipper), Max’s wife Lexi (Fernanda Romero), Lexi’s younger sister Emma (Malu Trevejo), and Emma’s dim-bulb boyfriend James (Matt Rife) all tag along.

The Wolf Mountain trail, as the park rangers inform the group, is about a day’s hike up from the ranger station. Neither A.J.’s group nor the rangers are aware that a trio of bank robbers, headed by Eddie (Danny Trejo), are hiding out here in the woods.

While there are legends about a wolfman on Wolf Mountain, no one really expects to see one. We realize more quickly than the characters do that there’s a serial killer on the loose.

The set-up is decent, but there are a number of problems with CURSE OF WOLF MOUNTAIN. One is that the day-for-night cinematography simply doesn’t work – we can see bright blue sky above the trees at times, and at others, it’s too dim to see the action. None of the characters (improbably for people on a camping trip) have flashlights or think to use their cell phones for illumination, so we wonder how they can see anything in the night sequences.

There are also crucial moments where mistakes are made, and by the time we figure out that these errors are made by the characters and not the filmmakers (when we first see them, it’s unclear), we’ve had ample time to get ahead of the intended surprise. Additionally, there are racial stereotypes that would have been out of bounds in the ‘80s.

One major asset here is the music score by Stephen Edwards, which reflects the influences of Jerry Goldsmith and Ennio Morricone, among other worthy composers.

The effort that went into making CURSE OF WOLF MOUNTAIN is evident onscreen, but the final results are very uneven.

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