‘Blackout’ Review — Larry Fessenden’s werewolf movie is ‘a crazy, fractured dream’ [Fantasia 2023]

A review of the new horror film, from the Fantasia Film Festival

Cult horror icon Larry Fessenden’s new werewolf film Blackout is an odd one. For a horror movie, it’s pretty slow; the actual werewolf scenes are few and far between, especially at first. Much of the movie is spent on discussions of local environmental land-use studies and how they relate to an ongoing construction project. However, when they do pop up, the werewolf sequences are fantastic, a lower-budget delight that manages to be both campy and eerily beautiful. In short, there’s plenty here to recommend, even if the movie is somewhat uneven.

The werewolf in question is Charley (Alex Hurt), an artist who also works as a painter in the construction sense. For the last few months, Charley has been experiencing blackouts that coincide with the full moon, waking up the next morning in the woods, covered in dirt and blood. Each time it happens, someone turns up dead; as a result, the small forest town of Talbot Falls is convinced they have a serial killer on their hands.

Charley is also going through a breakup, and he’s also recently lost his father. While going through his dad’s old papers, he finds evidence that could lead…