Review: "The Boy Who Cried Werewolf" (a little late)

After finally getting over the Halloween season, I finally have decided to give my review of TBWCW. First, let me say that with all the promoting this movie had from Nick (and myself), this movie didn't disappoint (well almost).


Unlike Disney movies, the cast of this movie is not a rehash of Nick stars tossed together to make this movie. In fact the only recognizable Nick star is Victoria Justice in her first lead movie role. She has previously been featured in the group cast of "Spectacular!" a couple of years ago, but this movie faded fast. A couple of cast members from that movie appear with Victoria in her current series "Victorious" (which I plan to review every episode in the near future).



The other recognized star of this movie is Brooke Shields. It's interesting that this former movie star in recent years have lowered herself to appear as Miley Cyrus' future mom in an episode of "Hannah Montana" a couple years ago and the short-lived series "Lipstick Jungle". Her character of house sitter Madame V. is well odd to say the least. She is both scary and somewhat of the hero of this movie at the same time.



It should be noted that this movie aired just 8 days before Halloween, but had several showings on Nick, TeenNick, and one showing oddly on NickToons. My thought was that with as much promoting that was done on this movie that it would have premiered the week before and have a dvd release the following week. Instead, unlike "Fred: The Movie" which did take this route, this movie has no foreseeable future on dvd in 2010. It leads me to believe that Nick will save this film as an annual Halloween show.



With all this in mind, I was surprised this movie didn't suck except for a few odd unanswered questions this movie held together pretty well. This doesn't mean that some old cliches weren't overused.



Examples of over usage includes:

• The overly torturous younger brother.


• The awkward girl who wears glasses becomes a swan by the end of the movie.


• The mean girls in the cafeteria.


• The awkward girl who lacks talent.

I could go on, but you get the point. The differences here is that Victoria is able to pull off these cliches without much trouble. Now on with the review...

Victoria Justice plays 16 year old Jordan Sands who is an awkward, allergic to everything, teen. She is a high school girl who wants to be on the school's soccer team, but lacks the talent to do so. The one person who stands in her way of anything is her brother, Hunter. He is always sabotaging everything she tries to do. This movie features the single dad who tries to handle his 2 children, while trying to survive difficult times. I heard no mention of what happened to the kid's mother. One night after receiving a strange envelope at their door, the family finds out that the family has inherited, a castle in Romania. Skip ahead and the family is at the castle in Romania (a big scary castle) managed by Madame V (Brooke Shields). Madame V is a scary keeper of the castle until the children slowly begin to understand the strange lady and then realizes she is more friend than foe.

One night while touring the castle's basement, our two children discover a strange lab and accidentally knock over a vile of werewolf blood. As a result, clumsy Jordan steps on the vile and ends up with the blood contaminating her body. The next night when the moon is full, she becomes a werewolf, not a scary one but kinda cute one. She chases her brother around the corridor of the bedroom level, then leaps on him, then jumps out the window.

Along the way this movie slugs along with a romance between Jordan and a local meat cutter, a tour around town and the father romancing a woman named Pauline. Pauline as it turned out is a vampire and one night takes the kids home, but she realizes that young Jordan is really the werewolf. So she fakes a stalled car in the middle of nowhere allowing her vampire friends attack the children (shades of Hilary Duff's movie Casper Meets Wendy, which had a similar scene), stuff them in the trunk of a taxi, and take them to Pauline's underground lair. In the meantime, Jordan is slowly transferring to a werewolf because of the full moon. By the time the children arrive at Pauline's lair, Jordan had fully transformed into a werewolf. Now some unanswered questions:

• What happens to Jordan's clothes when she transforms into and back from the werewolf? Do they rip off or are they hidden under the fur?
• How can both of the children fit into the small trunk especially when she turns into a werewolf?
• Why is the werewolf about 2 feet taller than Jordan and able to stand on its hind legs?

In the end, Jordan becomes a beautiful swan with no allergies and werewolf-free and most importantly talented in sports. Sadly, this makes any awkward feel even worse about themselves then they did before because the awkward girl seems to disappear.

There are funny parts of the film like the scene which features Madame V's phone having a Britney Spears' ringtone and the end scene of the karaoke of "Baby One More Time". Other than that this, the movie really lacks any real comedy.

It is hard to call this movie a comedy..it isn't. Not going to call it romance either..not enough of it. Not calling it a horror movie either...not really that scary. All I am hoping is that Nickelodeon decides to air this movie again soon and not wait until next Halloween to air it again or worse decide to cast it off to oblivion.Above average movie with decent cast, however preys to much on other movies and uses way too many over used cliches. Kinda fun way to lose about 1hr and 40minutes.

Final Score: *** 1/2 out of *****