Armin_Nikkhah_Shirazi

A teenage girl whose mother suffers from some mysterious debilitating illness notices strange changes in her body while also suffering continued harassment at her new job at a fish processing facility and has her first experience with love. Little does she know what her bodily changes will lead to....

I recently also saw the Norwegian VIKING WOLF (2022), and can't help contrasting these two Scandinavian entries into the werewolf oeuvre. Whereas VIKING WOLF is a conventional horror film in the manner of Hollywood horror (somehow the Norwegians seem to be consistently great at emulating Hollywood), WHEN ANIMALS DREAM is much less conventional, not just with respect to the basic story but also in how it is filmed and even how it changes some of the rules of werewolf lore (for example, there is no temporary full moon transformation, talk of silver bullets or rabid blind lust for killing).

I ended up rating both movies the same, just short of good, but for very different reasons. While VIKING WOLF is quite entertaining, during the last 15 minutes or so it suddenly changes gears and begins to unnecessarily pile one implausibility after another, to such an extent that I wonder whether that part of the screenplay was written by somebody other than the person who wrote the earlier parts. WHEN ANIMALS DREAM, in contrast, stays consistent, though it is so understated that this takes a bite out of its entertainment value. Fans of more conventional horror fare will likely find this film too boring, and even the climax in which multiple people are dispatched has trouble generating excitement. I guess people who like introspective, quiet movies may be the most likely audience for this film.

A woman somehow becomes convinced that she will die the next day, and the meme "I will die tomorrow" begins to spread among her circle of friends like a virus.

This could have been the premise of an intriguing and disturbing mystery/psycho/horror thriller, but the film-makers decided to go the arthouse route and basically threw any potential away. I actually enjoy arthouse movies, but there has to be substance, too.

We are introduced to several characters in an increasingly cursory fashion, caring for each new person less. The cause of this phenomenon is left open and the reason why people see mysterious red and blue lights when they "get infected" is unclear. The story appears to be told in a nonlinear fashion, which makes the slow-moving and boring events more difficult to make sense of, one person gets injured but we don't know why or how, it appears the "patient zero"(?) who "infected" the woman we are shown initially did indeed die, but we don't know why or how, and then the movie simply ends.

I found this film deeply frustrating. It ended up feeling like an elaborate near-1.5 hour prank played on the audience by the filmmakers, too see how much they can get away with wasting the viewer's time. That many movie critics rated this highly just tells me that their judgment is unreliable. The acting and some of the cinematography were decent, but that is not enough to make a good movie by a long shot.

An atmospheric historical prologue sets the stage for this Werewolf movie set in modern-day Norway, which is enjoyable for most of its runtime.

There is gorgeous scenery and some family drama as the mystery of the first victim's attacker unfolds slowly, with care and sensitivity, and the main actress who plays the police chief holds it all together with her excellent performance.

I happened to coincidentally watch the short horror film FOXES (2011) yesterday which used the heterochromia idea in a similar way as in this film.

The story makes a few unexpected turns here and there, and then comes the finale, where the film somehow goes off the rails by piling one illogic on top of another. This part is so poorly written it almost feels as if the last 15 minutes were written by a different person than the one who wrote what came before.

The werewolf remembers how to get home but not who its family and lover are? The vet wants to use a tranquilizer with no prior experience in this animal? The hunter simply runs his truck into a store intentionally and without a seat belt? The Werewolf with its monumental biting power is unable to bite through a simple protective arm sleeve?

There is also a cutting away technique used repeatedly enough that it becomes annoying. Finally, the ending is left open in exactly the wrong way. We don't know the state of key characters, whether there are more infected people and whether the secret came out. This was a really poor way to end the movie, and it mitigated much of the goodwill engendered. This is mainly just for Werewolf movie fans.