DOG SOLDIERS
Article by Steve Biodrowski
This is one of the best all-out, no-apologies, hell-bent-for-leather horror films to emerge from the beginning of the 21st century—a modestly-budgeted, action-packed effort that pits British soldiers against local werewolves with a taste for human flesh. After an inauspicious opening scene (as if in a FRIDAY THE 13TH knockoff, two campers in a tent get attacked and killed), the story shifts to an excellent sequence that establishes the main protagonist and antagonist who will clash later: after successfully completing a test run to prove himself worth of entrance to an elite unit, Cooper (McKidd) refuses a pointless order from Captain Ryan (Liam Cunningham) to shoot a dog, so Ryan kills the dog himself, just to show that Cooper's disobedience was futile -- an efficient piece of writing that reveals all you need to know about these two characters.
The remainder of the film follows a squad of soldiers on a training mission in Scotland, where they soon find that their war games are no game at all: they're being hunted by a vicous pack of intelligent werewolves. The first half of the film plays like an extended chase, as the soldiers try to outrun their pursuers and get to shelter, which they eventually find in the form of an isolated, apparently abandoned cabin. The rest of the film settles into the mold of NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD, with the soldiers barricading the house against the threat outside, while inside the tensions established between the protagonist and antagonist boil to the surface. Some fairly predictable plot twists follow (after all, why would the cabin be empty and undamaged, unless it was the werewolves themselves who lived there?), but the film plays out like a fast-paced firefight with little time to worry about such nitpicking details.
The performances are strong and the action is intense. The werewolf makeups are convincing, and the film wisely does not rely on computer-generated imagery, opting for on-set special effects. Although writer-director Marshal aims for genuine suspense, the gore is mixed with over-the-top humor: for example, a scene wherein a disembowled soldier is stuck back together with Crazy Glue makes you either want to bite your nails in squeamish disgust -- or relieve the almost unbearable tension by laughing out loud.
Marshall also includes numerous inside jokes that reference his favorite fantasy and horror films. One character is named Bruce Campbell (after the star of the EVIL DEAD films); another is Harry G. Wells (after the author of WAR OF THE WORLDS). In one remarkable scene, after an exchange of gunfire, a character named Spoon triumphantly disses the maurading wolves: "Dog Soldiers? More like pussies!" Which of course is the cue for a lycanthrope to reach through a window and yank him outside to his death. When our hero notices the abrupt absence and asks, "Where's Spoon?," his distraught comrades answer, "There is no Spoon!" (Think of what Keanu Reeves says in THE MATRIX, when he learns that the spoon in his hand doesn't really exist except in his mind, and you'll get the joke.)
Although DOG SOLDIERS found success at the box office in its native England and cleaned elsewhere around the world, the film went straight-to-video in the U.S. -- an undeserved fate, especially in the light of the theatrical release granted to the subsequent (and obviously inferior) werewolf flick CURSED (2005).
READ THE COMPLETE VERSION OF THIS ARTICLE, INCLUDING AN INTERVIEW WITH THE PRODUCER EXPLAINING WHY THE FILM WAS NOT RELEASED THEATRICALLY IN THE U.S., AT CINEFANTASTQIUE ONLINE.
