Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Werewolves Within’ on VOD, a Murder-Mystery Horror-Comedy That’ll Have You Howling

Now on VOD, Werewolves Within is two notable things: One, an adaptation of the deduce-the-killer video game, and two, director Josh Ruben’s follow-up to 2020’s Shudder original gem Scare Me. Ruben goes the horror-comedy route again, assembling a group of eccentric characters around a nice guy played by star-on-the-rise Sam Richardson (make it a Sam twofer this weekend, and watch him steal a scene or two in Amazon’s The Tomorrow War). Balancing laughs with scares is no easy task, but this one shows potential — let’s see if Ruben pulls it off again.

WEREWOLVES WITHIN: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?

The Gist: Park ranger Finn Wheeler (Richardson) drives the speed limit. He’s just that kind of guy. Straight as an arrow. Honest as the sky is blue. His new gig is in Beaverfield, Vermont, and he’s ripe for a fresh start — he’s stuck on his ex-girlfriend and is trying to wash off the wishy-washy. Cruising in the slow lane, he listens to instructional tapes about masculine assertiveness. “Say ‘BALLS,’” goes the lady on the tape. “BALLS!” he dutifully bellows. “BALLS BALLS BALLS!”

He arrives at the Beaverfield Inn, where he’ll be living at least for the time being. There, he meets the mail carrier, Cecily (Milana Vayntrub), who’s also new in town, but not so new that she can’t introduce Finn to all the weirdo locals. Jeanine (Catherine Curtin) is the innkeeper, a little loopy since her husband R-U-N-N-O-F-T with his girlfriend to Belize. Parker (Wayne Duvall) is the slippery oil man whose plan to run a pipeline smack through town has everyone arguing. Marcus (George Basil) and Gwen (Sarah Burns) are goofball rednecks. Joaquim (Harvey Guillen) and Devon (Cheyenne Jackson) are a gay couple transplanted from Brooklyn. Trisha (Micheala Watkins) is a loon who dotes on her yippy little dog, and her husband Pete (Michael Chernus) is a creep who gets handsy with the ladies. Dr. Ellis (Rebecca Henderson) is in town to counter Parker’s environmentally destructive plan. Oh, and on the outskirts in a cabin is Emerson (Glenn Fleshler), a gruff, intimidating bear of a woodsman who’d rather put a bullet in people than let them walk on his property, even to say hello.

As Finn and Cecily cultivate a little sexual tension, it becomes increasingly evident that Something Ain’t Right in Beaverfield. Trisha’s precious pup becomes a snack for something prowling around out there. All the power generators have been sabotaged, violently slashed. And Finn learns that Jeanine’s husband actually isn’t in Belize, but rather, he’s been under the house for a month, also violently slashed, and possibly gnashed as well. Yes, he’s dead; what else would he be? Between all that and a big snowstorm that blows in and knocks out power, all the aforementioned screwballs — save for Emerson — decide it’s safest to commune at the B&B so they can try to figure out what in the h-e-double-hockey-sticks is going on. In the middle of the night, Pete gets his hand bit off, so it’s patently obvious that someone in the inn is a werewolf. And all our protagonist Finn can do is try to figure out who’s the most suspicious person among this conglomeration of fruitcakes, flakes and strange birds.

What Movies Will It Remind You Of?: If Clue and The Howling had a love child that was also a movie, it’d be Werewolves Within.

Performance Worth Watching: Richardson and Vayntrub have HEAPS and HEAPS of chemistry. Someone cast them in a witty little rom-com, please.

Memorable Dialogue: After pointing out that his ex is stringing him along, Cecily propositions Finn with a way to release some tension: “Wanna do something violent?”

Sex and Skin: None, because the violent thing Finn and Cecily do is axe-throwing.

Our Take: Werewolves Within boasts a terrifically funny cast surely inspired by Mishna Wolff’s script, its dialogue finely honed to witty little points. In many ways, the film’s a quirk-off, with all the players riffing on stereotypes ranging from toofless yokels to gun-happy capitalist Republicans to strange ladies who knit too much, leaving Richardson and Vayntrub to keep the whole shebang from veering off course and crashlanding on Oddball Island. The murder-mystery conceit is a familiar formula, but it works because it commits to character-based comedy first, plot second.

The screenplay kind of satirizes our deepening socio-political divisions, tossing in the through-line about the Republican trying to lay pipe in Beaverfield — and since I put it that way, what the hell, let’s just say it’s also a metaphor for patriarchal toxicity. It’s no Knives Out — not even close — but at least there’s a little subtextual fodder to go along with the movie’s cheeky Ace of Base needle-drops and idiosyncratic vibes that ride the median between Northern Exposure and Twin Peaks. The movie loses some of its verve and focus down the stretch, devolving into mayhem for mayhem’s sake, and the werewolf shenanigans are comically half-assed, maybe on purpose. But its winking tone and covey of talent combine to inspire plenty of laughs, and that’s the most important thing.

Our Call: STREAM IT. Werewolves Within won’t have you howling at the moon. Or maybe it will? Is howling at the moon a good thing or a bad thing? Maybe it depends on how goth you are. OK, so it’s not the tightest metaphor. Just STREAM IT and enjoy yourself for 97 minutes.

John Serba is a freelance writer and film critic based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Read more of his work at johnserbaatlarge.com or follow him on Twitter: @johnserba.

Where to stream Werewolves Within