Wendigo ** (2001, Patricia Clarkson, Jake Weber, Erik Per Sullivan) – Classic Movie Review 2492

Writer-director Larry Fessenden’s 2001 horror movie is in the interesting, half-successful category, with a creepy atmosphere and some aspects of it working suspensefully and grippingly along the way to fizzling out in a weak conclusion.

A family – mom and dad Patricia Clarkson and Jake Weber and their kid Erik Per Sullivan – heads into the Catskills countryside in upstate New York for some winter peace and quiet, with the dad stressed out from his Manhattan ad agency photography job.

But the relaxing trip takes a terrifying turn after their car hits a deer and they meet a weird hunter (John Speredakos), who flies into a rage. When they arrive at their cabin, they discover that it’s next door to the property of the stranger, who gives the kid the carved spirit of the title.

The first-rate performances are a big asset in this eerily atmospheric, but basic, low-budget chiller that is watchable for horror fans. Somehow it just doesn’t get anywhere too much, though, or amount to a very satisfying experience. Basically, there’s too much Wendi and too little go. James Godwin is Wendigo.

A Wendigo is a half-beast creature appearing in the legends of the Algonquian peoples along the Atlantic coast and Great Lakes Region of the US and Canada. The creature or spirit could either possess characteristics of a human or a monster that had physically transformed from a person. It is associated with cannibalism.

© Derek Winnert 2015 Classic Movie Review 2492

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