Blood and Chocolate 2007 Werewolf Film
A Young Couple's Love is Threatened by Members of her Pack
Oct 5, 2009
Every seven years the leader of a werewolf pack chooses a new mate to rule beside him, and this time he has set his sights on the lovely Vivian. Unfortunately she has already fallen in love with a human, and the werewolves will stop at nothing to destroy their love forever.
Blood and Chocolate is very loosely based on a novel with the same name by Annette Curtis Klause, and was adapted into a screenplay by Ehren Kruger. The story focuses on Vivian, a member of a pack of werewolves, and a prophecy in which her mating with the pack’s leader will result in an ‘age of hope’ for the whole pack.
New World of Werewolves
Blood and Chocolate opens in a nightclub with a sexy woman dancing with a young man who becomes a little too friendly. She rejects him and leaves. The young man follows her and kills her. It turns out that the man named Rafe (Bryan Dick) is also a werewolf, and his pack is about to welcome a new mate Vivian (Agnes Bruckner) for their leader Gabriel (Olivier Martinez).
Later Vivian breaks into a church where she meets Aiden (Hugh Dancy). He is fascinated by the carvings and imagery in the church believing that they have something to do with werewolves. Aiden is obviously smitten with Vivian but she slips away before he can learn much about her. He discovers where she works and pursues her for a while. Ultimately she decides to give him a chance and she eventually falls for him.
When Gabriel learns that his intended mate is with someone else, he dispatches Rafe to get Aiden out of the way by whatever means necessary.
Ehren Kruger’s Werewolves
Even though Blood and Chocolate is based on a novel, it seems that a lot of the differences between the book and film happened when Ehren Kruger wrote the screenplay. The werewolves in Blood and Chocolate seem to have more in common with Anne Rice’s vampires than any previous incarnations of werewolves. They seem to be mystical animals, loyal to their pack, but still romantic creatures living in the void between the human and animal world.
The members of the pack display animal-like behaviour regardless of whether they are in human or animal form, and there are numerous occasions when they are seen leaping from rooftop to rooftop. They also change from human to animal in a flash of light. The slow, painful and horrific transformation seen in An American Werewolf in London is nowhere to be seen as the pack effortlessly become animals.
There is never anything wrong with experimenting and attempting to push the boundaries of a genre. Unfortunately, the same people that ask for something new are also the first to complain if an idea is too outside the established rules for a genre. The werewolf pack is an off-shoot of humanity and humans cannot become werewolves even if they are bitten. Regrettably the wolves the pack transform into, look like regular wolves that don’t seem to be mystical in any way.
Aiden is the Weak Link in Blood and Chocolate
The biggest problem with Blood and Chocolate is not the romanticised view of werewolves or they way they change. Nor is it the fact that Gabriel hasn’t aged in the seven years since finding his previous mate, but she has. It is not even Rafe who kills an innocent woman for rejecting him. Aiden is the biggest problem. He meets Vivian and whilst the sparks fly for him, she is obviously not interested and even runs away trying to lose him in a maze of streets. He later tracks her down to her workplace where she again rejects him. But he is still not put off and continues to pursue her until finally she agrees to go out with him. Later, when he discovers she is a werewolf he demands to know how she could have let him get close to her. Aiden has the trademarks of a stalker, he doesn’t take no for an answer, and follows Vivian around until she finally gives in. Perhaps Blood and Chocolate is trying to show a young male audience that if they like a girl then her obvious attempts to get away are simply her playing hard to get and they should not be put off.
The werewolves themselves and the whole idea of two people coming together regardless of their allegiances is a classic (think Romeo and Juliet). However, there are too many characters that are just thoroughly unlikable; Rafe killing an innocent girl for rejecting him makes him seem incredibly petty and very unstable. But it is Aiden as a creepy stalker who actually gets the girl that really ruins what could have been a decent film. If anything it would have been more enjoyable if Vivian have gotten her pack to simply rip him apart for not leaving her alone.
2/10
Very poor film that will leave any lover of the werewolf genre disappointed and wishing they had watched a re-run of An American Werewolf in London.
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