Wolf Girl

It would seem that Tim Curry would welcome the role of a kind-hearted, singing, dancing sideshow entrepreneur, roving through the European woods in a gypsy caravan. He seems to be enjoying himself greatly being able to be the understanding father figure to the physically impaired entertainers who also seem to be enjoying their work. It is also a coming-of-age story. Most teenage girls seem to think of themselves as grotesque until love is in the air. I had a little trouble with the ending. Without giving it away I can say that, with a good character, sometimes it's best to leave well enough alone. I give it 10 points, so there.

I think a lot of people didn't understand the message that was supposed to come through. The girl was unique but wanted to be look normal so bad that she turned into what people thought she was to begin with. A wild animal. All the "normal" teenagers had something about them that was out of the norm but looked completely normal on the outside. I think it sends a good message. If you twist your self up trying to be like everybody else instead of yourself you end up killing pieces of your humanity. A lot of people watched this film and assumed they the movie makers where making fun of a very real syndrome. I truly believe that if a person pays close attention to the message in the movie that they will enjoy a fine piece of imagination.

There's a saying about freak shows and movies featuring Tim Curry: You can't turn away. So it is with this movie, which features both Curry and a freak show. It's not a great movie, by any means, but you can't turn away. The plot involves an oddly attractive extra-hairy teenage girl who has lived her life in a freak show. She meets an odd boy who gives her an experimental treatment, but, as a side effect, the treatment turns her violent. In other words, there are no real surprises in the plot (though it didn't end quite the way I expected it to end), and there are a lot of "what the?" scenes. How did that character know that, why does this character do that, why was this scene in the movie at all, etc. It's an affliction common to made-for-cable movies, of course, and this one actually has less than most. But, beneath all of that, there are some great looking scenes. The scenery, costumes and photography give lots of the movie a neat, old-world sort of feel (even though it appears to take place in the present). Freak shows are an anachronism today, and the movie presents them as such. To watch the scenes around the show, you'd think that the movie took place at least a century ago, and that's to the movie's credit. It's the style that makes this movie worth watching. I've seen plenty of horror movies, made-for-cable and otherwise, that didn't even have that going for them.

I can't believe how underrated this movie is. Not only does it work with classic horror themes, but it mingles them with a lot of smartness. It is almost perfect, if you discount the Romanian origins of the lead character (mainly, Romanians have not been stupid enough to leave firearms in the hands of regular idiot people for a long time).

The story is of a hairy girl who wants to be normal. She trades her weird looks for a violent personality, driven by her liaison with a regular freak (not violent and sensible) and the continuous bullying by another freak and his clique. The cast is mixed: Earthsea's Shawn Ashmore, Tim Curry (from a zillion movies) and Grace Jones work together with the Romanian cast that provided most of the secondary and support actors.

It's not that the movie is a masterpiece, but it is quite good with its depiction of freakness in all of its forms. The idea itself was masterful. I've watched the movie thinking it would be a werewolf film, but in actuality it is not, it is a story about human nature and should, by all counts, become a classic.

Do watch it. It may not be high production values or insane special effects, but the story is something to behold.

Lili, the Real Wolf Girl, sends her Greetings. She saw the movie when it first aired. We would like to know when it will air again. Here her comments: "The movie was fun, but a little violent. Tim Curry was great as the Outside Talker. Victoria was wonderful and beautiful. Her hair pattern was was well done. My brother and I, and several cousins were born with Hypertrichosis, including my uncle, and his granddaughters. So we know what is like to be in the sideshow. So we did not like the "cage scenes." Believe or not, No wolf people, including Jo-Jo the Dog Face boy, were ever introduced in a cage. Over all the movie was fun to watch. A sequel would be nice, especially, with a happy ending. Lili" As translated and posted by Dieguin