Dominic Brunt: Wolf Manor is a pure monster movie
'Emmerdale' star Dominic Brunt says his new werewolf movie 'Wolf Manor' is "horror in its purest form".
Dominic Brunt says his new film 'Wolf Manor' is a pure "monster movie".
The 52-year-old actor - who is famous for playing Paddy Kirk in British soap 'Emmerdale' - took on directing duties on the British flick and he thinks that fans of the werewolf genre will enjoy it for it's gore and humour, as well as the nods to John Landis' 1981 lycanthrope classic 'An American Werewolf in London'.
He said: "What I really liked about 'Wolf Manor' is that it really is just a monster movie. There’s no back story, no characterisation, get up on the hills and get on with it. That’s horror in its purest form, really. That’s why I was drawn to this."
Brunt and his wife Joanne Mitchell run production company Mitchell Brunt Films together and the couple have made several horror films, including 'Bait', 'Attack of the Adult Babies' and 'Before Dawn'.
The filmmaker was approached by 'Wolf Manor' writers Joel Ferrari and Pete Wild to helm the project, whilst his wife acted as producer.
Brunt jumped at the opportunity and was particularly excited to learn that special effects expert Shaune Harrison was working on the movie, as he knew he would create a totally believable werewolf due to his past work on 'Avengers: Age of Ultron', 'Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace', 'Nightbreed' and the 'Harry Potter' franchise among many more.
Speaking to BANG Showbiz, Brunt - who previously worked with Harrison on his 2017 film 'Attack of the Adult Babies' - said: "You can’t do a werewolf film, with a bad werewolf. I was hired as the director on this, I wasn’t the writer or anything, it was kind of already up and running.
"I knew Shaune Harrison who designed the werewolf. I knew it would be good as he had already done 'Star Wars' and 'Harry Potter' and 'Avengers'.
"I think two days after I was hired I drove to see Shaune and looked at the design he was doing and the sculpture and he’d got this yak hair that he’d brought in, it was laid over this invisible glue on top of the prosthetics of the full suit.
“He did the face in six different plates so the actor could sneer and growl without it falling to pieces or without it looking like a mask. We could get really good, big close-ups, without it looking like a man in a suit. All the special effects were in camera, with a couple of scenes augmented with green screen blood.
"I think with the budget that we do things on in this country (UK) it is very hard to get a werewolf that looks good, so it was great seeing this full suit look so great."
'Wolf Manor' stars James Fleet, John Henshaw, Jay Taylor and Thaila Zucchi, with Morgan Rees-Davies playing The Beast.
It is available on DVD and as a Digital Download now.
