Misunderstood Monsters: THE WOLFMAN and The Curse of Toxic Masculinity
By Matt Konopka
Welcome fellow monster kids to Misunderstood Monsters. This is where I, Matt Konopka, sink my fangs into all sorts of beasts, ghouls, and creatures from above while I search for the humanity behind their frightening exteriors. From monster favorites such as The Wolf Man to obscure monsters like the whistling Shadmock, there is more to these fiends than bad hair days and gooey tentacles. Within them all is a piece of ourselves.
“Even a man who is pure in heart and says his prayers by night, may become a wolf when the wolfbane blooms and the autumn moon is bright.”
Those words, first spoken by the gypsy woman, Maleva (Maria Ouspenskaya), in Universal’s monster movie classic, The Wolf Man (1941), still howl with relevancy almost a century later. I’ve written in this space before about how writer Curt Siodmak was a Jewish refugee who had escaped Nazi Germany and, through his writing of The Wolf Man, was contending with his horror over being made to be a monster. Yet what makes the above quote so iconic is how it speaks to a universal fear of something savage lurking inside all men. And in the Wolf Man franchise, that terror manifests within a father’s misguided will to “make a man” out of his son. Lawrence’s father dismisses his pain in Siodmak’s script. Leigh Whannell’s Wolf Man involves a man terrified of becoming his dad. But it is Joe Johnston’s The Wolfman (2010) that delivers the strongest iteration of this theme, a curse of toxic masculinity running through the blood and brought to a head in a monstrous battle between father and son that destroys them both.
Story wise, Universal’s first remake of The Wolf Man isn’t all that different from the original. Andrew Kevin Walker and David Self’s script also sees Lawrence Talbot (Benicio Del Toro) return home to London and the Blackmoor mansion where his father John (Anthony Hopkins) resides. He’s come at the behest of Gwen (Emily Blunt), the fiancé of Lawrence’s brother, who has turned up dead at the hands of what is suspected to be a ferocious animal. An investigation into his sibling’s death leads him to a gypsy encampment on the same night they are attacked by a monster, leaving Lawrence bitten. You know what that means. Only this time it’s Lawrence’s father who is the werewolf that bit him. Predictable, sure, but a change that gives Johnston’s Wolfman some thematic teeth.
When we think of toxic masculinity, we think of men who pound their chests like loudmouthed bullies; the dude bros who think crying makes them weak yet constantly cry about every little thing that doesn’t go their way. Maybe you think of a certain Secretary of Defense who believes only men are fit to serve in the military (now would be an appropriate time to roll your eyes). Lawrence is the opposite of this sort of man, allowing his tragic transformation to claw into the flesh that much deeper. He is an actor. A man of the arts. One who is determined to lead a life in stark contrast to his father. John, on the other hand, embodies everything that some men deem to be peak masculinity. A hunter and former boxer, he has spent his life with an urge to prove his superiority over all living things. The carcasses of his kills are mounted on the walls of his home. Their furs adorn his body. In his eyes, this is the appearance of a man. “I’ve often wondered what you’d look like,” he says to Lawrence upon his arrival, the judgement of his following silence as loud as crackling thunder.
Johnston intentionally makes little effort to hide the fact that John is the villain of this story. As we notice on his train ride home, Lawrence carries a photo of his mother standing with him and his brother, their father noticeably absent. The statue of a wolf peers over “the prodigal son” as he enters the gloomy realm of John’s property. Our first look at the man even sees him emerge from the shadows with a sinister grin on his face. Long before Lawrence knows his father is a werewolf, he fears him, because John the man has always been the monster destroying his family. “This home has seen more than its fair share of suffering. Your brother. Your mother. Yes, I believe in curses,” remarks John’s servant, Singh (Art Malik).
The effects of such a curse arise well before Lawrence is bitten. Shortly after arriving in town, we find him at a tavern, where a group of men theorize over the murders. One of these men refers to Lawrence’s mother as a “whore.” Our tortured protagonist responds by splashing the man with his drink and inviting him to a fist fight outside. Understandable as this response is, it hints at a violence within Lawrence not seen until that moment…a primal anger bubbling up within him upon returning to the presence of his cruel father. Toxic masculinity…it’s like a poison that seeps into the blood. A venom from a father’s fangs. Men like John, they wish to shape their sons into “real men,” so they inject this poison, they yell, they get angry, they reject any sense of femininity in their boys. We can only imagine how many times Lawrence was met with abuse for not living up to his father’s standards for manhood. “I’m doing this because I love you,” men like that will say, as John says to Lawrence after forcing him to unleash the beast. “Finally, you’re the man I always wanted you to be,” he says.
But what kind of man is that? A man who sees everyone as weaker than he? A man who hurts? Who kills? That is the worst kind of man. That is a monster. And poor Lawrence? He’s a guy who strived to escape what his father wanted him to be yet became a victim of it anyway.
Some of you may find it silly to think of toxic masculinity as a curse. But what is a curse if not something terrible passed from one generation to the next and so on? Perhaps it can all be traced to male influence over society and boys born into a series of expectations for what makes a man, where they are outcast for disobeying such standards and rewarded for becoming their worst selves. Or maybe there is something in the blood that all men must contend with at one point or another, some overcoming their most monstrous inclinations while others succumb to the beast. It’s the proverbial question of nature versus nurture. Or, as Gwen ponders in the final line of The Wolfman, “It is said there is no sin in killing a beast, only a man. But where does one begin, and the other end?”
The Wolf Man franchise has been searching for the answer to that question since the beginning. 🩸
About
Matt is a writer and wannabe werewolf who began his love of horror at the ripe old age of 3 with John Carpenter’s Christine. He has previously been published on Dread Central, Certified Forgotten, Daily Grindhouse and others. He has also contributed essays for releases from labels such as Arrow Video. He lives in Los Angeles, CA, with his wonderful wife and their fur baby, Storm.
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