My Animal

Right, well I was under the impression that I would be in for a werewolf movie of sorts, as I sat down to watch the 2023 movie "My Animal" from writer Jae Matthews and director Jacqueline Castel. However, I have to admit that I hadn't even heard about the movie prior to sitting down and watching it, so I didn't exactly know what I was getting into here.

This movie failed to capture my interest, especially since the movie's narrative was slow paced, the visuals were sort of surreal, and it wasn't exactly the type of werewolf movie that I had hoped for. And I have to admit that the way that writer Jae Matthews concocted the script and storyline just didn't appeal much to my liking.

The only familiar face on the cast list for me was Stephen McHattie. The acting performances in "My Animal" were actually fair enough, despite the fact that the movie's plot and script utterly failed to entertain me.

Visually, then director Jacqueline Castel didn't deliver a movie that tickled me in the right places.

My rating of "My Animal" lands on a two out of ten stars. And this is definitely not a movie that I will pick up a second time.

Firstly, I appreciate the strong atmosphere and creative take on the horror romance genre as director Jacqueline Castlel does offer strong sense of direction on creating the atmosphere, characters, and narrative. Castel proves she has talents on film directing after creating various music videos for various artists like Zola Jesus, Moon Duo and Jim Jarmusch. Premiered at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival in the Midnight Selection, while ambitious, it was a decent slice-of-life romance horror movie.

Throughout, the production is solid and the camerawork is pretty good on capturing the Canadian landscapes and snowy atmosphere setting. There are some amazing visual presentations as the visuals felt dream-like, strange and colorful which reminded a lot of 80s and giallo horror visuals. Most of the performances were solid as the main leads are pretty good with some decent chemistry between one another.

The narrative and concept about queer lovers and werewolves is pretty awesome as not often LGBTQ themed concepts in horror genres are explored. However, while the narrative does offer some good ideas, the narrative doesn't feel as strong as it was hoping for. Many concepts that could have been explored wasn't really fully utilized which made the characters not fully interesting nor connectable.

There are good themes explored about sexuality, identity and societal expectations as the themes were explored but some themes could have used a little work on fully developing the characters. The musical soundtrack is pretty good which brought a good 80s vibe to it. The dialogue is solid while there were a few dialogue moments that felt kind of rough.

Overall, it's clear the movie has ambition and there are strong direction and good metaphors are explored, yet, needed some improvements. Decent Midnight Flick.

Trying to live with a deadly secret, a teenage girl struggling with her sexuality and the monstrous secret within her tries to strike up a romance with a new girl in town that shares her interests, but as the dark secret threatens to put everything in danger forcing her to fight for what she wants.

This was a fairly enjoyable if somewhat difficult to label as a genre outing. The main focus here is on the stellar coming-of-age storyline, managing to balance a fantastic setup involving the series of issues presented to her as a series of obstacles to overcome. With the build-up here involving the struggles of being a loner teenager in a small town such as this, growing up in that type of conservative environment while balancing the growing realization of her feelings for her neighbor with the usual trial and tribulations of growing up, and doing all that while trying to keep as dark a secret as her lycanthropic origins come to the forefront is a massively engaging way to go about this. Combining it all with the other family dynamics utilized here generates the kind of immersive drama that gives this a stand-out storyline to start with. On top of that, there's also a lot to like with the influx of artfully-accomplished scenes that focus on the inner nature of the werewolf within her. Taking place in neon-soaked sequences in a blank, black space where her carnal desires and experiences are presented, the hallucinatory approach taken here is masterfully accomplished. This ends up creating a genuinely enthralling series of setpieces that bring about a more erotic tone than expected even if they bring about the main issue with the film in that it's hard to call this a genuine genre effort. The dramatic approach and lack of traditional genre thrills for such an unwieldy running time cause this to drag on way too much rather than focus on the desired carnage and bloodletting most would desire. It's entirely the wrong attitude since it has different aspirations in mind but that should still be mentioned here.

Rated R: Graphic Language, Nudity, sexual scenes, and Violence.

My Animal is a movie about a subject matter I already like. Yet I was completely uninterested and bored immediately and throughout. I even stuck it out to the end in hopes of at least one cool scene or even a moment. But nope, it's just nothing, through and through.

There is barely enough substance for a short story, let alone a feature length film. Character motivations and decisions seem random and unearned. And the messaging is heavy-handed and obvious.

The only positive I can think of is the general tone, driven by the music and some cool trippy visuals. But that isn't nearly enough to warrant the time it takes to watch this movie. (1 viewing, 12/13/2023)

A sad excuse of a movie with everything wasted, besides the two leads who enjoyed very much their time in the movie and the supporting cast having fun in the snow and indoor.

The movie would have benefited from a tight editing bringing the runtime down to 45-50 minutes, to add some transformations, some thrills and some ghastly discoveries from both sides. To have this one categorized as horror and romance is only in Jacqueline Castel's head.

• Screenplay/storyline/plots: 4
• Development: 5
• Realism: 5.5
• Entertainment: 6
• Acting: 5.5
• Filming/photography/cinematography: 6
• VFX: 5
• Music/score/sound: 4.5
• Depth: 3
• Logic: 2
• Flow: 4.5
• Horror/romance: 3
• Ending: 0.5.