If you crave an over-the-top historical kung fu-fantasy epic with a good dose of voluptuous nudity, bravura machismo, and passions so intense they verge on ridiculous, then Brotherhood of the Wolf is your movie. Based (loosely) on an 18th-century legend, this French film follows a hunky scientist (Samuel Le Bihan, who's sort of a second-string Christopher Lambert) and his Iroquois sidekick/spiritual partner (Mark Dacascos) as they pursue a monstrous wolf ravaging the French countryside. Along the way Le Bihan gets entwined with a beautiful noblewoman (Émilie Dequenne) and a gorgeous prostitute (Monica Belluci) with secrets. The plot grows more and more incomprehensible, but the mix of torrid emotions, outrageous action sequences, and lurid titillation is really what the movie is about. Ignore the highbrow philosophizing and confused political intrigue; just enjoy the sensual images. --Bret Fetzer
Spotlight customer reviews:
Customer Rating: Summary: Great cult film Comment: I've watched this movie several times. Well made and will continue to be a favorite among fans. Service was excellent. Ordered and received in perfect condition. Customer Rating: Summary: Great film-Directors cut went on a little long Comment: thats assuming this is the same Directors cut from 2003...
Interesting that in my EU edition of the film, they refer to the beast as a "she"
I beleive it was genderless in the US release Customer Rating: Summary: Excellent monster movie! Comment: This is more of a monster movie than a horror film. Set in France a few centuries back, it tells the story of a werewolf-like creature that stalks the countryside. Based on a true story, it is a European-made movie and as a result features actors unknown to an American audience. They all turn in a good performance. The settings, costumes and evenly-balanced story all help to make this one of the better monster movies you will see. The special effects are cool and the atmosphere and cinematography are excellent. All in all, well worth watching! Customer Rating: Summary: Brotherhood of the Wolf Comment: This was a great buy. I would highly recommend it. It had extra footage and was a lot of fun to see. Customer Rating: Summary: This director's cut could have been better Comment: Don't get me wrong, I love the movie. Brotherhood of the Wolf ( Le Pacte Des Loups ) is an entertaining stew that mixes period costume drama, monster movie, martial arts action and political thriller. Every frame is beautiful to look at and it's a lot of fun.
In fact, if you haven't seen it, or only have the single disc domestic edition, I would definitely recommend picking this up. However ...
Some time ago, I picked up the canadian TVA films 3 disc collector's edition, which comes with a booklet and DTS sound - good stuff.
This "director's cut" version released by universal has most of the same features as the 3 disc collector's edition from TVA ... but ultimately lacks what is necessary to be called an improvement. The only reason to buy this is : as a step up from the single disc domestic edition.
The problems
1. There is no collectable booklet and no DTS sound.
2. The subtitles are poorly translated - enough to distract me.
3. No significant improvement in picture quality.
4. It is not properly formated for the current 16:9 screen aspect standard ( second line of subtitles cut off ).
I would think, in this day and age, that any dvd release of a widescreen foreign movie would take advantage of the widescreen TV format and still have both lines of subtitles viewable. Nope. Formated to be viewed in 4:3 ( unless you want to watch it dubbed in english ). Sure, you can use some alternate picture mode on your 16:9 TV - but then you have to trade off having the picture distorted in order to use the full width and have both lines of subtitles visible at the same time. They had a chance to fix that issue for this edition and blew it.
If you love this movie like I do, buy a used copy of the 3 - disc collector's edition instead of this "director's cut" - same features as this edition + DTS + better subtitle translation + collectable booklet. 'Nuff said.
