Beware the moon in the gory, thought-provoking and chilling new horror film Wolf Man. It stalks its way onto Cineworld screens this January so if you're looking for scares that will have you flinging your popcorn, you've come to the right place.
Here's everything you need to know including story, cast, age rating, trailer and release date.
What is Wolf Man about?
'Family man Blake relocates from San Francisco to Oregon with his workaholic wife Charlotte and daughter Ginger after inheriting his childhood home, left vacant following his estranged father's mysterious disappearance and presumed death.
'At the farmhouse at night during a full moon, the family is attacked by a werewolf that claws Blake's arm. They barricade themselves inside the home, but soon Blake begins to transform into something horrifying, jeopardizing the safety of his wife and daughter.'
Who stars in Wolf Man?
Wolf Man stars Christopher Abbot as Blake. The actor is best known for his daring roles in transgressive movies like Poor Things (2024) and Piercing (2021). Charlotte is played by Ozark star Julia Garner who has also appeared in films such as The Royal Hotel (2023).
Who directs Wolf Man?
Wolf Man is directed by Leigh Whannell who is an actor and screenwriter familiar to horror movie fans. Whannell burst onto the scene as one of the co-writers of Saw (2004), a movie in which he also played a key starring role. Whannell is one of the founding fathers of the Saw franchise: in collaboration with James Wan, who directed the first film, Whannell produced the next two films in the grisly series.
Whannell's other collaborations with Wan include his role as a writer on the ghostly Insidious franchise, another series in which he played a starring role. In 2020, Whannell scored a critical and commercial hit with The Invisible Man, a reworking of the classic Universal Studios monster movie recontextualised as a cautionary story of domestic violence and gaslighting. He now tackles the legacy of The Wolf Man from 1941, which originally starred Lon Chaney Jr. in the title role as the lycanthropic menace.
Whannell's Wolf Man (it drops the definite article from the title of the original film) heads in the direction of queasy body horror (think David Cronenberg's The Fly or Coralie Fargeat's recent hit The Substance). He tells What's On: "The first direction I thought of was disease. If you take the idea of transformation, the cleanest, you know, thematic parable there is, is disease. The human body changing.
"That’s probably the thing that scares me the most – that at some point I find out that I have some illness. This is going to change me in some way. I was talking to my brother about this yesterday."
Is Wolf Man connected to The Invisible Man?
Wolf Man and The Invisible Man are separate properties although both have their precedents in the classic Universal Studios monster movie era of the 1930s and 1940s. The Universal Studios Monsters helped make pop culture icons of fearsome creatures including Dracula and Frankenstein, as well as the Invisible Man and the Wolf Man.
Universal originally sought to create a Dark Universe of interlocking monster stories but that was nixed following the disastrous performance of the Tom Cruise film The Mummy (2017). There is now an emphasis on standalone films, of which Wolf Man is the latest.
Wolf Man was originally set to star Ryan Gosling with the latter's Blue Valentine helmer Derek Cianfrance set to direct. However, they both dropped out (Gosling still has a producer credit on the film), allowing Whannell to take over. He says: "If you think about any horror movie that is lauded as a classic, whether it’s The Exorcist, The Shining, Jaws, Psycho, whatever it is, I think the core thing that links them is the characters. It’s never the concept.
"It’s never the monster, to me. What makes The Exorcist work is that you believe in this little girl. What makes The Fly work is the performance of Jeff Goldblum. You put a different actor in that latex makeup, in that prosthetic makeup, you won’t have the same movie. And the writing in the film, you get to know this person and you love this person."
Is Wolf Man a Blumhouse movie?
Wolf Man is the latest chiller from the experts at Blumhouse Productions, which is headed up by producer Jason Blum. They're responsible for countless horror hits in recent years including the Paranormal Activity films, the aforementioned Insidious series, Get Out (2017), M3GAN (2023) and Five Nights at Freddy's (2023). The last two of those films have sequels arriving in 2025. Blum also produced Whannell's Invisible Man, which received acclaimed for Elisabeth Moss's performance as a woman stalked by the spectre of her abusive ex-husband.
“I always thought if The Invisible Man worked, I’d love to try and tackle The Wolf Man and try to do with The Wolf Man what Leigh did with The Invisible Man," Blum tells Den of Geek. "And I would describe that as taking the monster and [not] making it a four-quadrant movie for everybody, but returning it to its roots, which is like a straight horror movie.”
Is Wolf Man playing in special formats at Cineworld?
You can feel the visceral jolts and jumps of Wolf Man via the Cineworld-exclusive format 4DX. It's a multi-sensory proposition that uses moving seats, wind, water, rain and scent effects to make your favourite films feel all the more tactile and visceral.
What is the age rating for Wolf Man?
Wolf Man is rated 15 by the BBFC for 'strong horror, gore, violence and language'.
When is Wolf Man released in the UK?
Wolf Man is released on January 17th.
Where can we book tickets for Wolf Man?
Visit the link below to book your tickets for Wolf Man.
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