Beautiful, moving film.

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

Ginger Snaps (2000) *** (out of 4)Sisters Brigitte (Emily Perkins) and Ginger (Katharine Isabelle) have a strange fascination with death and they're as close to each other as sister can be. Their relationship is put to the extreme test when Ginger is bitten by a werewolf and slowly begins to change.You can go back to 1941's THE WOLF MAN and hear from boys who saw that film and thought about the puberty angle. You know, a man turning into a wolf and having to deal with the various changes just like a boy turning into a man. The idea of puberty and werewolves isn't a new thing but it's certainly given an interesting and nice twist in GINGER SNAPS. The film has a psychological way of dealing with girls starting their periods and turning into women. How their bodies change as well as their own desires and fears. The idea of sisters having to deal with this "change" on top of one of them becoming a werewolf makes for a very good gem.GINGER SNAPS pretty much came out of nowhere and become a good little hit across the globe. The film picked up quite a cult following and it's easy to see why for a number of reasons. For starters, the whole teen horror film is usually full of really stupid movies about stupid characters doing stupid things. That's not the case here as the screenplay is quite good and all of the characters are quite smart and intelligent enough to know what's going on. I thought the entire idea of a relationship being put to the test by one turning into a werewolf worked on so many levles including the fact that the physical and psychological aspects are questioned, talked about and are forced to be dealt with.It certainly helps that both Perkins and Isabelle are so wonderful in their roles. If we didn't believe that they were sisters then the film wouldn't work as well as it does. The two play off one another perfectly and there's no doubt that both of them are believable in their roles. The relationship and their ups and downs seem 100% legit and that brings a certain reality to the picture. The supporting players are just as good with everything fitting their roles quite nicely.There are some flaws with the film including the second half just not being quite as interesting as the first. I'd also argue that the film runs on a bit too long but these are only minor issues in an otherwise impressive film.

It's possible I'm biased, but I've never managed to make it all the way through this movie in one sitting. I just get so bored. Ginger Snaps is often feted as a smart, slick, witty teen drama/horror/comedy hybrid, using werewolf movie tropes as a metaphor for puberty, loss of innocence, and a character study of two sisters growing apart. It does have some snappy lines and genuinely funny moments, such as Brigitte (Emily Perkins) and Ginger (Katharine Isabelle) consulting the supermarket's 'feminine hygiene' aisle as Ginger's lycanthropic changes blur with the clunky plot point of her first period, but for me those are also the scenes that highlight the movie's weakness.For my taste, the preoccupation with Ginger's burgeoning womanhood - her menstruation, her 'wolfishness' portrayed through aggressive sexuality (including flipping the roles on a pushy boy who has the nerve to ask her "who's the guy here?" shortly before she pins him down and bites through his chest), pleasure- seeking, and short-tempered moodiness - are a set of clichés that never feel as clever or deep as they seem to think they are. The scene in which Ginger compares blood lust to the joy of masturbation never fails to make me cringe. It doesn't help that writer/co-story writer Karen Fawcett's dialogue sounds less like genuine teen-speak than the esprit d'escalier of a 35 year old remembering high school. Maybe it's because Brigitte and Ginger are so hard to identify with, being cast so firmly as outsiders from the start, with their shared obsession with death, a la Harold and Maude. Emily Perkins' performance - swaddled in baggy clothes, and hiding behind a forest of uncombed hair - is whole- heartedly committed to a vision of teen awkwardness, but the excessive wild-eyed staring overwhelms any sense of nuance or character development which could have brought the story some genuine depth in its first two thirds, and adds to the feeling of playing scenes for laughs instead of balancing dark humour with real emotion.The movie's practical effects are unusual, and I don't have a problem with that, though it seems to put off a lot of horror fans, and the lycanthropy is not the conventional kind. Most of the liberally splattered gore scenes are effected with high speed cuts and crunchy sound effects rather than a more psychological approach, which feels like an odd choice given the movie's attempts at locating itself so firmly inside the sisters' shared bond. Ultimately, Ginger Snaps may be many people's idea of a sharply comic modern(ish) take on horror movies - and particularly the role of women in horror - and if it speaks to you like that then great; such is the power of representation in movies. Unfortunately, for me it feels severely dated, clunky, and unrelatable, and it's easy to see the excitement about the movie as chronic over-hyping. If you go in expecting a teen drama with naked-molerat-werewolves and a somewhat second-wave feminist message, you might be pleasantly surprised, but if you remember the 90s trope of being too cool to take anything seriously and found it annoying then, you may want to give this movie a wide berth.Maybe there'll be a reboot one of these days to smooth off the rough edges from a potentially promising idea?

An immense success by any stretch of the imagination, the phenomenal "Ginger Snaps" is a winning combination of horror and humor, filled to burst with satire, subversion and plenty of thrills and chills. Even sixteen years after its initial release, it remains a wickedly entertaining and refreshing take on the werewolf legend, courtesy strong visual direction, a witty script and some absolutely wonderful performances. It's a cult masterpiece, and deserves far more attention and admiration than it currently claims. I do firmly believe that it is not only easily amongst the best werewolf films ever made... it is perhaps even among the best horror films ever made.In the Canadian suburbs of Bailey Downs, the Fitzgerald sisters lead a depressive life. Death obsessed Goths who get their kicks creating mocked "murders" for school projects, Ginger (Katharine Isabelle) and Brigitte (Emily Perkins) are social misfits who just can't fit in, and have created a suicide pact to murder themselves by age 16 should they still be stuck in their droll, painfully boring life. With a wild animal on the loose that is terrorizing the neighborhood and killing family pets at an alarming rate, the sisters decide to play a prank on their school's resident mean-girl Trina (Danielle Hampton), by making it appear her beloved dog is the latest victim. However, on this fateful night, Ginger also happens to get her first period, and it soon draws the attention of the real beast, which bites and mauls her.Narrowly escaping, the sisters soon realize that the bites are healing at an unnatural rate. Over the following weeks, as Ginger begins her journey into womanhood, Brigitte begins to notice disturbing changes in her sister... changes that might not be from puberty and maturation... but might be the effects of the creature's bite! He sister might be becoming a werewolf! And so, Brigitte must team up with drug-dealer Sam (Kris Lemche), in order to try and use his chemical expertise to find a cure to Ginger's terrible ongoing transformation!Director John Fawcett guides this tale with a sense of visual bravado, expertly crafting a hard-hitting and consistently hilarious mood and tone through keen storytelling. His smooth, flowing camera-work and quirky use of strange angles and occasional ambitious movement has a very nice feeling to it, hearkening back to the good-old days of horror before modern trends of shaky, gritty stylings began to take over. It's very tactful, slow-building and deliberate, which is quite a pleasant surprise for a film that's relatively contemporary.The script is co-written by frequent "Queer as Folk" and "Orphan Black" scribe Karen Walton, who is just a joy. Her quirky dialog and wonderful use of metaphor and subversive humor helps elevate the idea to fantastic new levels. At its heart, it's a story about what it means to become an adult- more specifically, to become a woman. And with its clever use of becoming a monster as a metaphor for puberty, Walton crafts an incredibly wild and entertaining tale that all should be able to relate and identify with. She also injects plenty of pitch-black humor that really helps give the film a unique identity and makes sure to pull the rug out from under you just enough times to keep you on the edge of your seat.The performances are also a vital key- the cast is lovely. Isabelle makes for a wild and unhinged character. She's just a ton of fun, and you get a whole range of emotion from what she does with the Ginger character. You will both laugh and cry thanks to her throughout the entire runtime. Emily Perkins knocks it out of the part as our protagonist Brigitte. Perkins has always been likable and notable in the horror community, thanks to her child-actor roots in films like Stephen King's "It." And here, she really stretches her wings, with an incredible role that's just dripping with everything an actor could want. She commands the role of Brigitte with grace and style. Lemche and Hampton, along with others such as Jesse Moss round out the supporting characters perfectly. In particular the highly likable Lemche, who does a great job with his quirky character. But I gotta give the most props to Mimi Rogers in the wonderfully insane supporting role as the mother of our leads. Rogers is just so much fun, portraying the sort-of perfect "supermom" who begins to show cracks beneath the surface when her idyllic existence is questioned. Perfect role.Add to that a top-notch production, and you have the formula for a classic! Cinematographer Thom Best does an amazing job with the lighting and composition, delivering grand imagery to compliment the story. Editor Brett Sullivan (who went on to direct the sequel "Ginger Snaps: Unleashed") does a fine job with the pacing and piecing together of sequences. And composer Mike Shields delivers the goods with his moody and mournful score. The central theme of the film still stands as just a gorgeous and melancholy composition- one of the finest horror themes in years.It truly is a shame that the film is not a household name, and has been relegated to the status of "cult film." It's a complex, genre- bending masterpiece that delivers non-stop laughs and screams, and it should be highly recognized for this. But it was a sad victim of poor timing, losing much of its audience due to events like the Columbine Massacre and other world tragedies that pushed audiences away from its tale of teens in peril. Here's to hoping that as the years go on, its small but dedicated audience continues to grow and grow. Because this film deserves all the fans it can get!"Ginger Snaps" is a perfect 10. It's one of the finest werewolf films ever made. One of the finest horror-comedies ever made. And perhaps even one of the finest horror movies ever made, period.

A breath of fresh air for the teen horror film and a thumbs-up for the independent movie, this low-budget Canadian werewolf film is a real shocker which starts off slowly and gradually builds to a fantastic climax which is pretty much edge-of-your-seat kind of stuff. The standard "innocent is bitten by werewolf and begins to turn" story is propelled by some original touches, like the puberty angle which sees the teenage bite victim mistaking her transformation for mere menstrual woes. Frank dialogue, excellent developed characters, and actors who play each other off superbly are just some of the reasons this film became something of a sleeper hit, garnering generally rave reviews from critics who actually bothered watching it.What kept me watching the film closely is the unpredictability of the narrative; you're never quite sure where the film is going, or who might be the next victim, so you just have to keep watching to see where they're going with the story. The pacing is spot-on and the story ideal. Things start off on a decidedly realistic tone, with teenage woes and high school heartbreak on the top of the list. This gives us time to learn about and even like the principal characters, namely Emily Perkins and Katharine Isabelle as teenage sisters Brigitte and Ginger. Once the characters are properly introduced, the morbid and gory events begin to build up and we're then sucked into the film all the while, eagerly awaiting the next macabre happening and seeing what will happen. Themes of morbidity, friendship, and power run throughout to keep things interesting and the characters are likable only because they're all too human - no mindless sentimentalising here, thank god.Emily Perkins is the unorthodox leading lady and has a really interesting, thought-out character. Thankfully she isn't the pretty, vacuous untalented crowd-pulling lead a la Katie Holmes but instead a damn good actress. The person who really shines, however, is Katharine Isabelle, lending pathos and sympathy to her character's plight whilst at the same time being the monster and the villain. Some of her scenes are heartbreaking and difficult to watch as you end up liking her character so much despite her actions. The supporting cast are uniformly excellent, whether it be Mimi Rogers as the quirky mother or even the Chinese janitor. Respect to Kris Lemche, who invests his drug dealer with subtlety and charm.Thankfully for a modern horror flick, GINGER SNAPS doesn't skimp on the gore effects either. It isn't the goriest film ever made or anything but there are plenty of severed body parts and arterial fountains to appeal to the car-crash crowd, especially in the blood-drenched finale. But a sense of humour and lots of black comedy (involving severed fingers) keep it from becoming just too dark. Being a low budget film, the special effects aren't exceptional but they are solid and more than adequate, especially the much-criticised werewolves which aren't so bad either - it's nice to see animatronic creatures instead of CGI abominations and I know which I would take over the other any day. Despite being a tragic, downbeat tale this is never less than gripping and one of the best modern horrors I've seen for some time.