The Boy Who Cried Werewolf

Hey everyone. The other night I was searching through my Netflix and came across the movie The Boy Who Cried Werewolf. I figured it might be an interesting movie, so I put it on. It is a movie for children and, as expected, it was more funny than scary. Sure, there were some semi-scary parts but not that many. The movie was released by Nickelodeon, the main character is played by Victoria Justice. 

The plot was your basic supernatural movie for children/teens: There were your traditional clichés, and there was the creepy castle in Romania.  They set the movie in a town called Wolfsburg. I've since learned that this is the name of an actual town, but it is not in Romania; it is in Germany. I am not sure that they were really going for accuracy, but with that being the case, I think they should have made up a city name that did not already exist. I think they were aiming to have the small town of Wolfsburg be just outside of Transylvania. There was mention of visiting Dracula’s castle. They also had your classic, creepy housekeeper, and throughout the movie, whenever someone said her name, wolves howled. The funny part about this was that the characters heard the wolves and actually commented on the howling. They tried to avoid saying her name as much as possible.

One of the more annoying clichés I saw in the movie was the transformation that the main character went through during the movie. At the beginning of the story she is a shy, awkward, and geeky teen. It seemed she would do anything to get noticed by the guy she liked. (She even paid for his lunch!) Now, I am not a hard core feminist or anything, but it makes me sad to see girls being portrayed like that in movies. It was not so much the shy, awkward and geeky part that I object to, but the doing anything to be noticed by the guy is unfortunate. They did save it, though, at the end. After going through her transformation throughout the movie she does change her outlook. She is no longer as shy or awkward, but she is still geeky, which is awesome. When the stereotypical hot guy from the beginning offers to buy her lunch, she turns him down, paying for her own lunch, and then she shoots him down when he asks her to the prom. For those who like the romantic flavour in a movie, she does get a guy at the end — he ends up with the guy who fell for her in Romania before she went through her transformation.

And then there is the brother. He is the movie buff and monster buff of the family. I found it interesting how he deals with the fact that his sister turns into a werewolf. He has to figure out everything in the plot of the movie and save his sister. It is actually due to his curiosity in their new castle that leads to his sister turning into a werewolf, so it is only fair that he should be the one to save her — which he has to do a few times. And what is a werewolf movie set in Romania without a few vampires? 

I really enjoyed the movie overall. It definitely makes for a good Halloween movie for those looking for something to watch with the children in the weeks to come.