Surprise Surprise!!!... ‘Wolfhound” Review

My eldest son today woke up with a fever and a sore throat so The Clockwinder ran him in to the doctor... long story short, Strep Throat. This required us to pick up some antibiotics and as we waited for the prescription to be filled I stopped at the local Blockbuster. They had a couple movies that I wanted and when I went to pay, the girl said “You know its 4 for 20.00?” so I went to look for a couple more... I choose one simply because it looked like it would fit nicely into my Bad Fantasy Film collection. Noting earlier posts on the jalopy, I wasn't expecting much more then a good laugh when I slid “Wolfhound” into the DVD player... boy I was wrong.

“Wolfhound” is a russian film and on the back cover it had a quote from a “critic” claiming it was “Lord of the Rings meets Conan”. As the movie began... I was “This is exactly like “Conan” you know the drill, blacksmith family, marauders boy becomes slave thing, but you know after 8 minutes I wasn’t minding it.

The boy grows up into the typical vengeance seeking warrior, sporting impressive scars and traveling with a Bat as a companion ( I hate bats... but I loved this one). He tracks down the guys responsible for his parents death all the time doing the right thing, helping the down trodden and saving princesses (ok... one princess). The movie ends in a fight against the not so human big baddy and becomes a epic Wagner like battle between the hero and a woken god.

This movie actually works, the production value is fantastic and it being Eastern european, isnt like allot of films we have seen. Sure, this film isnt Hamlet, but its a good solid Fantasy film, about 173 times better then most schlock we have to digest. The city they go to, almost entirely log construction...was amazing.

There were no Hollywood “plastic” babes in this movie ( for better or worse) but they had some really good female roles. There was one scene, where they save a “witch” and a baby that ended up not having much of a impact or reason story wise, but that could have been editing, she did provide some back story.

I was just surprised as heck with this movie, I had never heard of it, was ready to Riff on it and ended up being a fan. Check this out if your a genre fan and get a chance.

( I have a copy I can pass around )