This review is part of Nevermore Horror’s coverage of the Blood in the Snow Film Festival
Synopsis:
A creature-feature twist on the Agatha Christie Whodunit thriller-genre, that turns into an action-packed race for survival when the killer is revealed.
Diving headfirst into Hunter’s Moon is very much akin to the film’s opening act. I felt like I’d been invited to a party where I knew none of the locals, there was personal drama going on and I didn’t know how I should react, and everyone that I was introduced too seemed like a stereotype. There is so much going on at the start of the film—so much to digest—that one can easily be both overwhelmed and, unfortunately, underwhelmed.
The film doesn’t quite toe the line with other films in the genre. It’s a bit quirkier, a bit more upbeat, and a more comical than I was expecting. What I had anticipated was a dark, broody werewolf flick and what I watched felt more like a social commentary with stabs and jabs at multiple cliched norms. The film awkwardly introduces character after character in the first act in the most obscure of ways. The Father, Fenris, The camgirl “stalker” …Yannick… I understand this is the setup for the later acts, but it was honestly a hot mess. The only characters I really took to were Stan and Veronica; the nerd and the drunk…I guess that says a lot about me.
The editing was really choppy, with at least one scene having what seemed like repeated dialogue, which is just a no go. The score was incredibly random, with strange lounge music playing during conversations or after death scenes. I just didn’t quite understand some of the choices that were made. There were also far too many closeups that were literal nostril shots. The audio was also generally poorly mixed. Volumes were all over the place; dialogue sometimes louder than the music—sometimes the weird house music louder than the dialogue (This may have been due issues with my screener copy, which I was warned about). This really became unavoidable about midway through the film, where half the conversations were delivered with a “YouTube chill lounge mix” playing on repeat in the background and then the other half with no background score at all.
and way too much of this blue hue
I hate to take shots at anyone’s art or artistic expression. I hate to be negative when trying to look for positives. Hunter’s Moon just really did not live up to expectations. It felt like a cheap horror film pervading a subpar score and a subpar story. The characters were cliched and the writing inexperienced. The plot was thin and the acting thinner. The more I watched, the more it descended into mayhem…just not the usual madness I enjoy in a horror film.
The werewolf itself is pretty well done and the very last act (the climax) was the most cohesive of the film, but it doesn’t do enough—in my opinion—to save what was mostly a mediocre watch. It’s horror on a budget and that’s OK. I wish there had been something there to transform my opinion. Thanks for reading and as always, stay sordid. Trailer and poster below.
