Wolfen (1981)

Wolfen is based on a 1978 novel, The Wolfen, by Whitley Strieber.

Christopher Van der Veer (Max Brown) a rich and powerful New York real estate developer, is brutally attacked and ravaged during a late-night visit to Battery Park with his beautiful wife, Pauline, and their purebred Borzoi Russian Wolfhound. His brain is taken. A ritualistic killing, perhaps? International terrorism, perhaps?

New York Police Lt. Dewey Wilson (Albert Finney) is assigned by his boss, Warren (Dick O'Neill), to the case with criminal psychologist Rebecca Neff (Diane Venora).

Coroner "Whit" Wittington (Gregory Hines) tells Dewey that Van der Veer was killed (slashed) with a hard, sharp weapon, but absolutely no traces of metal – not even microscopic – were revealed in x-rays of the victim. What does turn up, however, is hair. From Pauline Van der Veer's slashed kidney and from a new victim, a derelict in the south Bronx. And it isn't human hair.

As their investigative wanderings continue, we get to watch a boa constrictor sneak up on a white lab rat, catch it and munch it down. But we also find out from Ferguson (Tom Noonan), a zoologist, that the hair found on/in the slain bodies is definitely canis lupus (wolf). He also mentions the tie between Indians and wolves.

Dewey's focus turns to the Native American Movement and activist Eddie Holt (Edward James Olmos), who works on "high steel" bridge construction. And in order to talk to him right away, Dewey has to walk up the bridge's suspension. Major pucker factor, for sure, for sure.

The conversation with Eddie sends us to a shape-shifting scene designed to lead us down a merry werewolf red herring path.

Derek starts getting a little paranoid, and Rebecca can't shake the feeling that she's being stalked. So it's inevitable that they find comfort in each other. Whit starts taking an active in-field role in the investigation and unfortunately pays the price.

It turns out that the killers are Wolfen spirits that kill to protect their hunting grounds – the slums, where now, old buildings are being razed, demolished as urban renewal marches on. The homeless, the drunks, the druggies, the diseased – the dregs of the world who crash and live there – are Wolfen food. And that food supply is being threatened.

Guess what. The movie ends, but they're still there.

Grade: B