The Company of Wolves

Yes, again. Sit down! I see you trying to leave and shit...

In a wonderful burst of coincidental fortune, I had the opportunity this weekend to see the movie The Company of Wolves, based off the short story collection The Bloody Chamber, written by Angela Carter and likewise based on old fairy tales.

*pant pant*

*breathe*

Alright, I'm dizzy, I'm good...



Well, actually I had to watch it with my mother, who hates anything remotely horrific, and...the movie is indeed horrific. It's not a horror movie through-and-through but some scary shit happens, such as hedgehogs (don't ask). And I know she's going to be looking at men with unibrows for years to come (you'll have to see the movie).

So anyway, if you love relatively low-budget, indie, GOOD movies like I do, or just plain ol' cinema obscuro like I also do, I encourage you to see this movie out. By all means. I'm not endorsing illegal, I'm just saying that sometimes you can hide your IP address. Or at the very least, try reading the collection of short stories. You'll love them or else be extremely disturbed. If you don't mind that, then...you'll love them. You could also, you know, buy the book but I know some of us are on a budget for real.

At this point you may be asking, "Okay, why the hell am I still listening to you?" Well, my point is this. Last night (I think it was last night...maybe), I mentioned this movie to Danz and he mentioned, in turn, that it kind of sounds like a similar movie called Ginger Snaps. No, not the delicious cookie, yet another symbolic werewolf movie.

And, at first I was livid that he dare compare one of my favorite movies ever to that...that cinematic cry for help, but you know what, he has a point. Both of these movies use, strangely enough, werewolves to metaphorically describe "female issues": with Company of Wolves, the werewolves actually--in my interpretation mind you--used to describe men, more or less, for a young girl going through puberty, having her first cycle and discovering her sexuality. With Ginger Snaps, werewolf = puberty more or less.

It's interesting to me, actually, this symbolic usage of the werewolf. The Company of Wolves & indeed Angela Carter's original short story (well, short stories from Bloody Chamber) are a sort of distilling & modern update of the Little Red Riding Hood stories. Depending on what you read or how you want to interpret them, the moral usually revolves around "don't talk to strangers, kids!" or "hey girls, don't mess around with strange men". Not that it doesn't have other interpretations of course. Let's ignore those.



Anyway, the usage of the werewolf is interesting to me. The decision to use the werewolf to represent those damn bodily changes in Ginger Snaps is sort of fascinating--you have to wonder, why wolves? Is it because women become real bitches on their periods? Monsters? Did I really just want to make that joke?

Uh, yeah, it's just sort of something interesting to mull on, why wolves are used, actually a lot, as this symbol of repressed sexuality. You see it all the time in cartoons, movies...kinda the same thing with vampires, but with vampires I think it's a little more blatant. Actually, neither creature started out symbolizing sexuality (I don't think with vampires, anyway), but it's also interesting how we've just morphed them that way over time.

Also, I am officially so good at this image using thing. It's 3 in the morning y'all, let me ramble on...