Poll Position: Brotherhood of the Wolf (2001)

For the movie poll last week I decided to give some near winners of past polls a second chance. This resulted in an easy win for Brotherhood of the Wolf. I had high hopes for it considering how quickly it took the poll and how sure people seemed to be about it. I was surprised to learn that this is actually a French film, but I'm all for subtitles so that didn't bother me. I've also heard this described as a pretty good martial arts movie, so I was looking forward to some good action from Mark Dacascos. So there you have my mindset going into this film. Find out what I thought of it after the jump!


Right off the bat, I'd like to say how confused I was that the star of the film, Mark Dacascos, was in the background on the cover of the DVD. I mean, he's the star isn't he? He was THE Crow in the tv series spin off of The Crow. He's the Chairman in the Iron Chef tv series! He's the one doing all the martial arts, how could he possibly NOT be the lead actor? Well it turns out all my assumptions based solely on recognizing him were wrong and he's just the supporting actor to some guy named Samuel Le Bihan. Disappointment #1.

The film starts strong, but then drags on for far too long

The story intrigued me though as it started. We see a woman running through a field, covered in blood and wounds, from some unseen assailant. She comes to the edge of a cliff, and unable to go any further she begins to climb a massive boulder. She scrambles up, only to be stopped midway and lifted into the air and slammed repeatedly into the rock until she breaks in half! Soon after we learn of The Beast which is described as a giant wolf, a monster, a demon! "I love supernatural monster movies!" I thought to myself. But then as the movie progressed it turned out to be quite a bit different than that. Disappointment #2. Oh, and also extremely predictable. Disappointment #3.

So at least there was going to be a lot of martial arts action right? Well, yes and no. There were a few decently long scenes of said action. Unfortunately, Brotherhood is needlessly 2 1/2 hours long and DRAGS on and on with massive spans of no action with uninteresting characters babbling in between. Disappointment #4. Not to mention that the special effects on this movie have aged terribly in my opinion, and the monster and anything else added in with CG is awful and sticks out like a sore thumb. Disappointment #5.

This picture does nothing to explain how good Monica Bellucci constantly looks in this film

Well, not all the characters were uninteresting. I liked Mark Dacascos who played Mani, a North American Indian who was taught French and came back to France with his friend Gregoire. I also liked the mistress Gregoire regularly visits played by the beautiful Monica Bellucci who I knew I recognized from somewhere. After some searching it turns out she was the stunning Persephone in The Matrix Reloaded and Revolutions. On the downside though, I really didn't care one bit for Gregoire, or his love interest, or the bad guy or anyone else in this overly long movie. Disappointment #... ah forget it, I'm not even going to count anymore.

I'm really not sure what went wrong with this movie. It has all the pieces to make a movie that I should really like, but instead I found myself constantly and continually bored out of my mind. I couldn't wait for this movie to end, and I swear at one point I figured it was wrapping up, and I was only half way through! I can't believe how much they stretched out this simple story of "get the monster". It was like watching an episode of Scooby-Doo crossed with Deadliest Warrior. BUT HOW IS THAT NOT A COOL MOVIE?! I just don't understand how they screwed this up.

How did something like this end up being lame?! What have they done?!

I'm dumbfounded at how much I didn't enjoy this movie. In almost every way I can think of it let me down. Characters, plot, effects, action, pacing... even the mystery part wasn't mysterious and I'd figured it all out well before the half-way point. My recommendation is to stay away from this movie. If it was good in 2001, it certainly aged fast, and not well. Sorry to all those who really like Brotherhood of the Wolf, but I really just couldn't get into it at all and the whole thing was just one huge disappointment.