The Wolf of Snow Hollow (2020) is a movie we recently rented off Amazon Prime for $5.99. The movie focuses on a recovering police officer who is super stressed out and appears to have a werewolf serial killer in his little town. While he tries to convince everyone it's a man the body count racks up. This movie is directed by and stars Jim Cummings (Thunder Road) and was made on a $2,000,000 budget. This movie also stars Robert Forster (Jackie Brown),Riki Lindhome (Last House on the Left) and Chloe East. The storyline for this is actually very interesting and comes together pretty well. I loved the CGI for the werewolf and the ultimate evolution of that character and the self dialogue of the main character was hilarious at times. I did want a little more from this film in terms of action rather than the over dedication to the police officer's self reflection. This is a fun and unique film but far from perfect. This is also one of those movie you watch once and probably don't need to see again. I'd give it a solid 6/10.

WOLF OF SNOW HOLLOW is a difficult film to describe in a meaningful way. Yes, on the surface, it's a werewolf movie. A small town, with an understaffed and undertrained police force, is forced to contend with a supernatural killer. Can the committed but anger-management challenged sheriff (Jim Cummings) coral his team long enough to track down the creature?

It's a horror movie, yes. But really, it's not that terribly scary. It isn't horrifically gory (but it's a little gory),so you don't have that guilty pleasure. It's also a comedy (surprise!),but not quite a knee-slapper. It isn't a parody movie in the vein of SCARY MOVIE; it mines most of its humor in the bumbling antics of the police and other townspeople.

None of this sounds like a recipe for a very successful movie, and yet there is something about WOLF OF SNOW HOLLOW. Writer/director/star Jim Cummings is a singular filmmaker. He's created a cop-hero who is far from ordinary. He wants to do a good job, but is nearly crippled by either self-doubt/self-loathing or by his own incredibly loose cannon temper. His father, also in law enforcement (and well played by Robert Forster in one of his final roles),counsels him repeatedly, but Cummings is a mess. It's a very interesting and unusual characterization; one that actually feels fresh and surprising. His fellow cops are loyal to him (even the ones smart enough to see his flaws and worry),but he even struggles to see that his peers are on his side and not working against him. The werewolf is almost an externalization of the lycanthrope within him. (Although, to be sure, the movie is not as psychologically heavy as what I just described!). So we watch the movie rooting more for this flawed guy to get his act together rather than to see the werewolf tracked down.

Cummings is ably supported by Forster and by Riki Lindhome, a promising and smart detective who also very much has Cumming's back.

The movie moves at a brisk pace, which is good, since what it doesn't have is a lot of tension. Even though the cops are bungling, we always assume they'll "get their werewolf." Most characters are not terribly well developed and we don't invest much emotionally into what the creature is doing to the town.

Really, in the end, it's just an odd, quirky, singular little film that I enjoyed probably more than I should have. Tough to describe, and difficult to recommend to just anybody, I'm still very glad I saw it. I'll certainly be checking out Cumming's previous effort THUNDER ROAD, and probably anything new he comes up with.

There's a lot going on thematically in this uneven horror comedy.

The film is the brain child of writer/director/star Jim Cummings, whose film "Thunder Road" I adored. "The Wolf of Snow Hollow" isn't as good as that movie, but that's partially because it's more ambitious, so I give him credit for trying.

Cummings plays a police officer (again) with rage issues (again) and an alcohol addiction. Gruesome murders start happening in the small Utah town of the film's setting, and after Cummings first rejects the far out theory that they might be the work of a werewolf, he begins to toy with the idea that maybe there's something to it as the murders continue to go unsolved.

The werewolf concept acts as an allegory for both the monstrous impulses Cummings himself feels and that he's driven to when drinking, and the predatory world of men in general and the danger they pose to women in general and his teenage daughter specifically. There's clearly a MeToo inspired vein of male apology running through the film, but it all gets a bit muddled by a screenplay that doesn't quite know where it wants to go. The ending is unsatisfying, but the movie leading up to the ending is pretty decent. It doesn't do a great job of striking the right tone -- the humor isn't ever quite funny enough but everything else is treated a bit too lightly to ever be taken seriously -- but the film does have a bold sense of style that I appreciated.

I like what I've seen so far of Cummings as an actor and director and this film will keep me coming back for more.

Grade: A-