31 Nights of Halloween Horror - Night 2 - Wake Wood

Wake Wood

90 Minutes

Dir. David Keating

2009/Ireland

After shutting down in 1979 with their final film, The Lady Vanishes, Hammer comes back with Wake Wood, their first theatrical release in 30 years.  Oh Hammer how we love thee, your old gothic settings, and your lesbian vampires.  But like the story behind this film, something’s should not be resurrected.  Tonight let’s go to the town of Wake Wood and see what the hell is going on there.

So Littlefinger from Game of Thrones is a Veterinarian.  He and his wife have a lovely daughter who one day decides to feed a piece of sliced turkey or something to a German Shepherd who would rather eat the little girl instead of the turkey.  Not really sure of any of the logic that goes on, it just happens, which you kind of find out watching the rest of the movie, things just happen with not much of an explanation.  So needless to say Littlefinger and his wife are very distraught and decide to move to a small Irish town called Wake Wood where he will be a doctor to all the farm animals.

One night driving through town his car completely dies and loses all power, kind of like when a UFO flies over you.  No UFO though, this is more of that movie logic.  So they get out and walk through the woods to a farmhouse, where the wife goes around back and witnesses all the townsfolk doing some kind of ritual.  She takes off before being seen, they presumably head back to their car, which now starts and drives home.

Fast forward through some nonsense and ultimately the leader of Wake Wood who also happens to be Littlefinger’s boss, proposes that the town can bring his daughter back to life for three days so they can say their proper good byes.  But there are some stipulations.  Keep her away from bright light, don’t get here wet and don’t feed her past midnight.  Wait, wrong movie.  She must not have been dead for longer then a year and they need to bury her again after three days.  Lucky for Lilttlefinger his daughter has only been dead for 11 months, 22 days, 14 hours and 6 seconds, or some shit.  So a little grave digging, a little corpse molestation, a little cocooning, a little fire, a little chanting by the towns people and presto, Littlefinger’s daughter returns as good as new.

But this being a horror movie, we know there has to be a catch.  Everything thing is going great on the first day, second day there are some signs that maybe the child isn’t all she is cracked up to be and by the third day, the shit is hitting the fan as well as plenty of murdered animals and people.  Perhaps like on Game of Throngs Littlefinger isn’t really telling the truth.

A combination of Pet Semetary and The Wicker Man, Wake Wood really has nothing new going on here.  There are plenty gaps in the story telling and the logic behind things just doesn’t add up.  While Hammer did produce or co-produce some other good movies upon their return, Let Me In and The Woman in Black, their theatrical debut was kind of a dud.  Some times you just can’t go back and sometimes you just shouldn’t.  If you are squeamish over some animal gore, this movie seems to have no problem putting it on display.  Ultimately very little held my interest here and the toughest thing about Wake Wood was just staying awake.