#ReleaseTheCravenCut: The Story of Wes Craven’s Werewolf Film and Its Hellish Production
The 2000s were a unique time in Horror history. From remakes of films like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Friday The 13th, and The Ring (which is an American remake of a Japanese film called Ringu) to sequels in successful franchises like Freddy vs Jason, Hellraiser Inferno and Scream 3 to even original concepts such as Saw, Hostel and Cabin Fever, it seemed like there was a wide variety of horror goodness to consume back in those days.
Not much can be said for the werewolf subgenre, however, as this subgenre didn’t get a whole lot of love during this time. Vampires and Zombies on the other hand?? A LOT of love during this time both from major studios and indie filmmakers. Werewolf movies during this time were mostly indie films, with a few big studio films to boot. One of these films is Cursed, A werewolf movie from 2005 that would DEFINITELY live up to that name…and I’m about to tell you why.
Announcement and Hype
Cursed was first announced in October of 2002 by Miramax, and Bob Weinstein (one of the infamous Weinstein brothers) said that Cursed was “Going to reinvent the werewolf genre” when it was released in the fall of 2003. Weinstein then went on to announce that Wes Craven of Nightmare on Elm Street and Scream fame was set to direct the film with Kevin Williamson (who wrote Scream 1 and 2) set to write the script and Rick Baker of An American Werewolf In London fame set to do the special effects for the film. The cast at the time consisted of Christina Ricci, Jesse Eisenberg, Judy Greer, Scott Baio, Skeet Ulrich, Omar Epps, Mandy Moore, Robert Forrester, and Heather Langenkamp, among others.
It felt like Weinstein had just assembled an Avengers-esque cast and crew to make this film into exactly what he said it was going to be and as you can imagine, the hype was building. The hype for this film at the time was off the charts and for damn good reason too considering the crew that had been assembled.
Numerous articles being written and word of mouth spreading like wildfire set this film up to be one of if not THE most anticipated horror film of 2003. I mean, what could possibly go wrong?? You have an established director that has had success in this genre before, a writer that knew exactly what he was doing, a star-studded cast AND you have by far THE best special effects guy for a film like this. But as you’re about to find out, not all things that seem good on paper actually work out to be as good as they seem.
Now Entering Hell…enjoy your extended stay!
In early 2003 production began on Cursed, and all seemed to be going well at the time. Wes and the crew had shot and filmed 90% of the film and was getting ready to shoot the ending…when Bob Weinstein stepped in. Right before they could film the ending for the original cut of the film, Bob Weinstein came in, shut the production down, and mandated that script be rewritten and the film be re-shot. This halt in production caused Rick Baker to leave the production and his effects were replaced by a company called KNB.
The cast had also been shifted around as Skeet Ulrich, Heather Langenkamp, Omar Epps, Robert Forrester, and Mandy Moore among others were all replaced. Scott Baio, Judy Greer, Christina Ricci, and Jesse Eisenberg are the only cast members who survived the entire length of the production. So after going and rewriting the script and doing all of the reshoots that Bob mandated, ending included this time, Wes showed it to Mr. Weinstein to get his approval, and to no one’s surprise…he mandated EVEN MORE reshoots and rewrites, essentially giving Wes and the crew the middle finger…much like the werewolf you see above (yes that is an actual scene in the movie).
The reason for this is mainly because Mr. Weinstein felt that the ending was “too bleak” and he felt that some of the plot points didn’t make sense to him so Wes and the crew went to work and did all of the reshoots that Bob wanted. Remember when I said earlier that Rick Baker and his special effects were replaced?? KNB had effects of their own that they wanted to use, which is fine so as a result, hardly any of Rick’s effects were used in the film but do you want to know what Miramax and the Weinsteins did? They committed three cardinal sins in my opinion: 1. They gave Rick Baker ALL of the credit for KNB’s work in the opening credits of the movie. 2. They replaced ALL of KNB’s practical effects with CGI effects that look like they were ripped out of a cutscene in a late PS1 video game…in the middle of the PS2’s life cycle, and it’s aged like 17-year-old milk that someone left out in the sun and 3. They went and cut all of the blood and gore out of the film so that it could get a PG-13 rating because Weinstein wanted to “appeal to a broader audience”.
By the end of production, the film had been worked on for a grand total of two and a half years from announcement to the end of production when it was originally supposed to be a couple of weeks or so. Wes Craven originally signed on for this film because the plug got pulled on the film he originally wanted to do, which was a remake of Pulse, a movie that was originally released in Japan in 2001 under the name Kairo. Wes ended up working for DOUBLE the amount of the fee that he originally signed on for, and he said that he could’ve made 4 films in the time that it took to make Cursed.
A man by the name of Patrick Lussier, who was the editor for this film and frequently collaborated with Craven, said in an interview with YouTuber Pizowell that this was a film that no one wanted to make and as sad as it is to admit…I can tell. This movie can be summed up in three words: Hot. Mangled. Mess.
The reason why I say that is because you can tell while watching the movie that this film takes a bunch of different footage of the same film and just stitches it all together in hopes that no one will notice. If Wes and Kevin truly cared about this movie, they would’ve either fought harder for the original cut, or they would’ve just found a sneaky way to get the original cut out instead of the cut that we got.
Release, Reception, and Rolling The Credits
Cursed was released on February 25th, 2005, and was slammed by fans and critics alike, and for damn good reason too. The reasons were the stitched-together nature of the story, tropes that everyone had seen a million times over being reused, and the fact that the effects were so terrible and there wasn’t any gore at all in the theatrical cut.
This film is a perfect example of what NOT TO DO if you’re a studio that’s working with a master of Horror like Wes Craven. Have faith in your directors and let them tell the stories that they want to tell through the medium. And if you see this post and you want to see the original cut of the film, let’s see if we can’t get #ReleaseTheCravenCut trending again.
Also if you want to read the original version of the script, click right here and go to the download link in the article! I hope you enjoyed reading this and if you did, be sure to share it around. Also, have you seen Cursed?? If you have, what did you think of the film?? Let me know in the comments. That’s it for this first blog post since my return and I’ll see you in the next one!
