A few months ago, on July 20, 2019, I talked about a werewolf movie that I really enjoyed--"Ginger Snaps." In it I happened to mention the other werewolf movies which I think are the best ones, including the subject of today's post, "Dog Soldiers". Which, as the title suggests, I don't think gets its due. Anyway, I'll follow my usual pattern of a brief spoiler-free synopsis, followed by a longer, spoiler-saturated recap, and conclude with a discussion of some of the movie's strengths and themes, and then a bit of info about the cast and crew.
A small squad of English soldiers are sent on weekend maneuvers in an isolated part of Scotland. It's some war games for the six of them. However, the area they're in is infamous for mysterious disappearances of hikers and campers. The squad eventually meets up with another group of military men, and learn a disaster is going on. Someone, or somethings, are hunting them, and it's for real. The survivors make it to an isolated farm house, where they make a last stand against their inexplicable enemies. More surprises occur, and more deaths. Will anyone be alive when dawn breaks?
(SPOILERS AHEAD UNTIL MARKED) "Dog Soldiers" opens in the Scottish wilderness, where a happy couple is camping. After an exchange of gifts, including a silver letter opener, the man and woman retreat to their tent and begin to have sex. However, a furry arm reaches in and pulls the woman out, and after a bloody struggle, does the same to the man.
The action abruptly shifts to North Wales, where a man is running from soldiers. It's Private Cooper, who is being tested by a Special Forces group, led by Captain Ryan. Cooper fails the initiation when he refuses Ryan's order to kill the tracker dog. After a break of four weeks, we're back in the remote Scottish forest, as a helicopter drops off six men--Privates Cooper, Spoon, Terry and Joe, led by Corporal Bruce and Sergeant Wells. As this is just an exercise the squad is equipped with blanks for their rifles. Cooper tells his mates that the area they're in has seen many travelers disappear, with only pools of blood left behind. The audience learns a little about the men--Bruce is a cynical intellectual, Spoon is very gung-ho, Joe is obsessed with football, and Sergeant Wells is a very tough, but caring leader. After a dying cow falls off a cliff into their camp, the men are uneasy. The next day they find the camp of the Special Forces unit they were "battling." It's a mess--destroyed and abandoned equipment, lots of blood and gore, but no bodies. Except for Cooper's old nemesis, Captain Ryan, who's wounded but alive. Ryan is in a raving panic, and the squad's attempts to call for help using their communication equipment fails. They do manage to locate live ammo for their guns, though, as the Special Forces unit was fully armed. As they move through the woods in the fading sunlight, half-dragging Ryan, enemies appear. In their flight Bruce accidentally impales himself on a tree branch, and then is brutally finished off by large furry beasts. Wells is also severely wounded by a weird attacker, but Cooper manages to drag him away. The squad races to a road, while having a firefight with the odd creatures pursuing them. Luckily a vehicle appears on the road, and the men are able to get in just ahead of the monsters. The driver takes them to what she says is the only home in the area, an isolated farm house.
At they enter the men find the house empty, but obviously only recently abandoned. The driver, Megan, says she knows the family that lives there. She also says the nearest town is four hours away. Just as the men regroup and decide to drive to the town, they find Megan's Land Rover is destroyed, and then it explodes. The men retreat back inside ahead of the enemies. Most of the men board up the doors and windows, while Cooper and Megan treat Well's wound by pushing his intestines back in, and supergluing the wound shut. Megan says she's a zoologist, and that she came here two years before. Ryan, meanwhile, has changed dramatically, as he's completely calm, and his wounds are almost miraculously healed up. The men are suspicious, and tie him up. An attack by the beasts is barely beaten back, although Terry is pulled out by them. Megan admits that she knows Ryan, as he hired her to learn about werewolves. An attempt to get the other vehicle in the barn goes awry, as Joe is killed just as he drives it near the house. The men interrogate Ryan, and he reveals that their maneuvers were an attempt to capture a werewolf, as a possible biological weapon. Well's team was the bait, and considered expendable. Ryan changes into a werewolf, and flees by jumping out a window. The men realize that the werewolves are the family that lives in the house they're in. Well's wounds are very healed too--he knows that he's changing into a werewolf as well. Megan suggests that the werewolf pack will be in the barn, so they get the vehicle into it, and burn the barn down using gasoline and Molotov cocktails. As they make it back inside, Megan reveals that this was a diversionary trick--she's a werewolf too, and let the others into the house using the back door. None were in the barn. Spoon flees into the kitchen, and is eventually killed by the werewolves. Wells and Cooper go upstairs, and after a battle they break through a bedroom floor into the kitchen below, which is now vacant. Wells forces Cooper into the cellar, giving him a roll of film that they've shot of the werewolves. Wells stays behind, as he's changing. He manages to explode the house, and the werewolves, by igniting the oven's gas line. Down in the cellar, Cooper has survived the blast, but Werewolf Ryan attacks him. As Cooper runs around the cellar he sees many bodies of earlier victims, and some of their belongings. Cooper stabs Ryan with the silver letter opener, and then shoots him dead when the silver incapacitates Ryan. The final scenes are Cooper walking out of the destroyed house with the only other survivor, the family's pet dog. Newspaper clippings and photos tell us that he successfully proved that werewolves exist to the outside world.
First off, when we're discussing a movie about werewolves, the obvious question is "Do the werewolves look good, and convincing?" And I think the answer is clearly, "yes." The filmmakers used the common scheme of hiding the werewolves for the first half or so of the film. You see them only in quick glimpses, or only parts of their bodies. However, later you do see them more clearly, and their entire bodies, and they hold up impressively. Mostly, in my opinion, because they're real actors, in real werewolf suits. Sure, films laden with CGI monsters would be able to show the werewolves more, and doing more, even elaborate activities, but to my eyes they don't look real--they invariably look cartoon-y and video game-ish. Give me an actual, elaborate, latex-y, costume, coated in physical slime and blood. The other special effects are well done too--there are many gunshots, and explosions, and they're all convincing. The blood and gore (often in the form of people's intestines) shots are similarly strong and disturbing. So despite their "less is more" strategy, and the overall low budget, the werewolves in "Dog Soldiers" seem creepily plausible.
Another common question is, "What traditional werewolf tropes does the story use, and which are made up for it?" For the most part, the werewolves in this movie are quite traditional. They're turning, it appears, because of the full moon, and they show a weakness to silver, and fire/explosions. Otherwise, though, they're extremely tough--bullets and blades, and even boiling water hurt them, but they heal up quickly from these wounds. A person afflicted with lycanthropy seems helpless to change, with an exception I'll get into later. Probably the biggest difference in the "Dog Soldiers" werewolves is their intelligence, which seems identical to when they're in human form. They're not dumb beasts--they destroy the vehicles to trap the soldiers, and one of them is able to fire a gun back at the men. Plus the usual chain of events is followed, in that if a person is wounded, but not immediately killed by a werewolf bite or clawing, they will become one themselves. Another difference seems to be their feeding habits. Several human bodies are being aged in the family's cellar, and were probably in the cooking stew, meaning the family (named the Uaths), appear to be eating human flesh even while in human form. This also means that several (most?) of the soldiers were inadvertent cannibals, too, as they're seen eating the stew, with its unidentified, pork-like meat base.
Arguably the most interesting, and mysterious character is Megan. She's doesn't provide much background information, and what she does say may be embellished, or even completely fabricated. It's safe to assume she joined the werewolf clan recently, but the circumstances are muddled. Was she a zoologist studying something in the area, and then accidentally got bit and turned? Or did she go there intentionally to study werewolves, and possibly even wanted to be turned? Her relationship to Captain Ryan is unclear, too. Did she do into the Scottish wilderness in the first place because she was hired by Ryan, or did he contact and use her after she'd been turned? And what were her motivations? It's implied that she wanted to leave the Uath family, and was hoping that the military had a cure for her werewolf-ism. Or perhaps she was trying to escape, which is why she wasn't hunting with her "family" as a werewolf during the attack on the military squads. Although, of course, escaping wouldn't solve her problems, as the next full moon would see her turning into a beast somewhere else, or at least strongly tempted or compelled to do so. Also, how was she able to resist the full moon as long as she did? Captain Ryan and Sergeant Wells appear to turn against their will--are they helpless because they're brand new werewolves? Can you learn to resist? It sure seems so in Megan's case. She only gives in and changes after she's given up hope that the soldiers will save her somehow. We can learn some other things about what happens as well. It seems like once you change into your werewolf form, you're locked into it until dawn. Otherwise the Uath family would presumably have done the obvious trick of resuming their human forms, gaining entrance to their house, and then attacking the troops from inside once the time was right. (Also, the family name is a clue to their nature. In Gaelic "Uath" means "dread, terror, solitary, or alone," and also, "hawthorn" or the letter "h.")
Going on, the Uath family's actions seem foolish, in retrospect. (And, as usual, I realize their actions were surely crafted by the writer/director so the movie would be more interesting, and exciting, but I'm referring to the logic within the story itself.) Taking an occasional hiker a few times a year would be okay, since people do go missing in the wilderness sometimes under normal circumstances. But taking out an entire military group is a terrible, self-defeating idea--even if they'd succeeded in killing everyone, the military would surely investigate heavily after that. Especially since some in the Special Forces knew they were trying to capture a werewolf. And keeping human bodies, and the victim's possessions in their house would also be clear evidence against the family. Were they that arrogant? Or does their blood lust as a werewolf overcome their intelligence in some ways? This is especially dumb assuming that Megan told them about Captain Ryan, and his team. They should have lived off cows for a few months or years, until the rumors and suspicion died down.
One of the movie's influences, aside from the siege-like plot of "Night of the Living Dead," and "Zulu," is the "Alien" series. The Special Forces, like like the evil Weyland-Yutani company, are bent on capturing werewolves for use as military bio-weapons at all costs, including innocent soldier's lives. Although, evil as their plan is, at least it makes more sense then trying to use Aliens, (or velociraptors, from the "Jurassic World" movie). These werewolves could be effective, if properly controlled. They're able to be human for most of the time, so they could infiltrate an area like a regular human spy. Then, once turned, they are extremely formidable--unlike those other creatures I referenced, they're invulnerable to most common weapons. Also, they appear smarter than those other two creatures, too, even while in monster form. So, yes, this plan, at least the way it was implemented, was evil and unethical. But at least it had a chance to work. I don't know enough about writer/director Neil Marshall's political beliefs, to figure out if he's possibly anti-military, or at least anti-Special Forces, and that's why he wrote them the way he did. It could also be that it was just a way to tell the movie's story, of course. Either way, it works. I can't recall another movie which pitted trained soldiers versus werewolves. (On that note, I recommend the book, "The Wolf''s Hour," by Robert R. McCammon, which concerns a werewolf who works as a spy.)
(END OF SPOILERS--SAFE FOR ALL READERS) English director/writer Neil Marshall has had an up and down career. "Dog Soldiers" (2002), was his first movie, and is generally well regarded, and his sophomore effort, the claustrophobic, women-in-caves film "The Descent" (2005) was even more lauded, and successful. Alas, his subsequent movies haven't been as respected. "Doomsday" (2008), "Centurion" (2010), and the recent "Hellboy" remake (2019), have mostly underwhelmed (I've only seen, and disliked, "Doomsday," but haven't heard good things about the others). He has, though, directed well respected episodes of several big television shows, such as "Game of Thrones" (2012, 2014), "Black Sails" (2014), "Hannibal" (2015), and "Westworld" (2016). So hopefully he'll rebound, and start making very good movies again. Of the actors, "Cooper" portrayer Kevin McKidd is probably best known for roles in such films as "Trainspotting" (1996), "Hideous Kinky" (1998), "De-Lovely" (2004), and "Hannibal Rising" (2007), and major roles in the television shows "Rome" (2005-07) and "Grey's Anatomy" (2008-). Sean Pertwee (Sergeant Wells), the son of a former "Dr. Who" Doctor, was in such films as "Leon the Pig Farmer" (1992), "Event Horizon" (1997), "The Prophecy: Uprising" (2005), "Devil's Playground" (2010), and "Howl" (2015). The evil Captain Ryan was played by Liam Cunningham, who was in such movies as "First Knight" (1995), "The Card Player" (2004), and "Clash of the Titans" (2010), but is surely most recognized for playing Ser Davos Seaworth in "Game of Thrones." Emma Cleasby (Megan) has appeared in films like "Doomsday" (2008), "F" (2010) and "Soulmate" (2013). Finally, one of the werewolves (there were only three full suits) was played by Ben Wright, who's more of a stunt performer. Some of his jobs in this career were in "Sherlock Holmes" (2009), "Skyfall" (2012), "Kingsman: The Secret Service" (2014), "Spectre" (2015), "Avengers: Age of Ultron" (2015), "Solo" (2018), and television's "Game of Thrones" once more.
So, if you're looking for a good werewolf movie during this Halloween season, or even during the rest of the year, I heartily recommend "Dog Soldiers." It has a simple, but effective story, good acting, great special effects and gore, and even a couple of laughs to break the tension. And good disturbing scenes, too. Check it out.
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