by Anthony O'Connor
Worth: Discs: 4, The Film: 3.5/5, The Extras: 4/5, Overall: 7.5/10
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Cast:
Emily Perkins, Katharine Isabelle, Kris Lemche, Mimi Rogers, Tatiana Maslany, Eric Johnson, Brendan Fletcher, Nathaniel Arcand
Intro:
…a singularly odd trilogy that manages to resonate over two and a half decades later.
The Film:
Of all the many euphemisms for menstruation – visit from aunt flo, the crimson tide, shark week, on the blob – surely “the curse” is the most evocative. This rather dramatic term for a natural, albeit irksome, biological process gained popular usage in the 18th Century and is still trotted out today, although generally by religious nutters or the terminally ironic. The idiom takes on a new slant, however, in the Canadian werewolf flick Ginger Snaps (2000), and to a lesser extent its sequel Ginger Snaps 2: Unleashed (2004) and its prequel Ginger Snaps Back: The Beginning (also 2004). These films use menstruation as a catalyst for violent change and transformation, in ways both effective and surprisingly cerebral.
So, let’s pop a CD of nu-metal into the discman, head down to Hot Topic and talk about this trilogy of very entertaining, extremely era specific, bloody lycanthrope flicks.
Ginger Snaps (2000), dir: John Fawcett
Ginger Snaps is the story of teenage sisters, Brigitte (Emily Perkins) and Ginger Fitzgerald (Katharine Isabelle). These young ladies live in the Ontario suburb of Bailey Downs and are incandescent with mall goth contempt for everything and everyone around them. We’re talking about a couple of real life Darias* right here. They snark and snarl when anyone tries to get close and take graphic photographs of their own faked deaths to amuse themselves and scare the normies.
All is not well in Bailey Downs, however, as local house pets are being torn apart by some kind of wild animal. Said critter eventually runs into our unlikely heroines, savaging Ginger before getting conveniently skittled by a passing van. Soon afterwards, Ginger starts going through changes. She becomes more confident, moodier, hornier and hairier plus other more bizarre symptoms that can’t be attributed to her newly arrived menstrual flow. Brigitte tries to intervene, but it might just be too late to save Ginger before she becomes some kind of monster.
Although Ginger Snaps isn’t exactly redefining the werewolf flick, the devil, as always, is in the details. Karen Walton’s script features a pitch perfect rendition of early 2000s suburban Canada, and the social dynamics of Brigitte and Ginger feel well realised and lived in. It certainly helps that both Emily Perkins and Katharine Isabelle give stunning, breakout performances as our jaded-before-their-time protagonists, ably supported by the likes of Mimi Rogers as their slightly befuddled mother, Pamela. The script’s more subversive, quasi-feminist elements don’t sustain until the third act, mind you, and the ending feels more rote that revelatory (which isn’t helped by ropey monster effects), but this is a rock solid bit of low budget horror with enough social commentary and black comedy to stay intriguing throughout. The film didn’t actually make a huge impact at the cinema but over time became a cult hit on home media, meaning that before too long we were greeted with…
Ginger Snaps 2: Unleashed (2004), dir: Brett Sullivan
Ginger Snaps 2 starts off mere weeks after the ending of the first flick and has Brigitte using injections of monkshood (in the first of the film’s not terribly subtle drug addiction analogies) to fight off the lycanthrope curse bestowed on her by Ginger. After some shenanigans that result in Brigitte having a bad reaction to the purple goo, she is placed in an involuntary rehab centre with other troubled young ladies, including wide eyed innocent (or is she?) Ghost (a very young Tatiana Maslany). Now it’s a race against time, with Brigitte needing to get her drugs back or she’s about to have withdrawal symptoms of a very hairy and fangy nature. And just who is that strange furred figure that appears to be stalking her?
Ginger Snaps 2: Unleashed is a funny little film. Although it lacks the wit (or budget) of its predecessor, there’s enough intriguing story and well-observed character beats to keep the affable viewer interested as long as they don’t ask questions like “Why on earth is no one calling this troubled teenager’s mother?” Emily Perkins is fantastic as always, Eric Johnson is wonderfully awful as the sleazy orderly Tyler and Tatiana Maslany is a scene-stealer as the wide-eyed moppet with more going on than is first revealed. The flick also features a third act rugpull that’s so audacious that your humble word janitor gaped with shock. It also ends on something of a cliffhanger. Surely that will be resolved in the next flick?
Right?
Ginger Snaps Back: The Beginning (2004), dir: Grant Harvey
Wrong! The third and final Ginger Snaps movie is a prequel… for some reason. Set in 1815, it features Brigitte and Ginger who are completely identical to the first film except situated in the frosty Canadian frontier during a punishing winter. Would you believe it, Ginger gets bitten by a mysterious beast and the sisters take shelter in Fort Bailey, a dark place that has a few secrets of its own.
Part mystery, part retelling of the first film (which we remind you was only four years old at the time of this flick’s release), Ginger Snaps Back is a stylish, moody but at times perplexing film. The winning team of Isabelle and Perkins continues to pay dividends, and there are surprisingly solid werewolf effects, but the overall package is more diverting than delightful. Worth a watch for sure, but it’s doubtful you’ll return for multiple viewings.
The original film comes in gorgeous 4K with its sequels in perfectly acceptable Blu-ray quality.
The Extras:
A solid roster of extras here. Mainly legacy features for Ginger Snaps 2 and 3, including audio commentaries, multiple short featurettes dealing with stunts, special make-up effects, costume designs and set walk throughs. It’s pretty brief stuff, but plenty to dig into for fans of these more divisive entries.
The main goodies come with the first film, however. There’s an audio commentary by director John Fawcett and a second commentary from writer Karen Walton. There are cast auditions and rehearsals which are a hoot, and it’s great to see how Emily Perkins and Katharine Isabelle had their characters down pretty much from the start. There are deleted scenes, older short featurettes like Being John Fawcett, Making Of, Creation of the Beast and a few other bits and bobs.
There are also longer form docos and featurettes like Ginger Snaps: Blood, Teeth and Fur and Growing Pains: Puberty in Horror Films. However, best of the lot is The Pact: Ginger Snaps Forever – a very entertaining, newer doco about the film, its inspiration, creation and larger place in cinema.
A thoroughly decent grab bag of extra features all packaged in a lenticular hardcase bundled with a slightly goofy-looking poster.
The Verdict:
Ginger Snaps is one of the more interesting horror flicks from the 2000s and its grimy brand of strip mall gothic has aged surprisingly well (haircuts and music aside). It comes bundled with its flawed but interesting sequels, describing a singularly odd trilogy that manages to resonate over two and a half decades later.
The 4K print of the original is very fine indeed, with the blu-ray sequels looking thoroughly decent, and there’s more than enough special features to justify this deep dive into a very personal, stylised, menstruation-tinged view of Canadian lycanthropy.
*You kids remember Daria, right? She was cool.
