Christophe Gans directs Samuel Le Bihan, Mark Dacascos and Vincent Cassel in this period martial arts horror mystery about a botanist and his Native American partner who travel to the French countryside to catch the possible werewolf terrorising all the fair maidens.

Handsome outdoors setting and 18th century costumes. Elongated hand-to-hand combat set pieces. Matrix inspired editing and FX. Some nice Hammer style monster stalk sequences. A protracted conspiracy. A movie that tries to just about be everything… succeeds… and then exhaustingly spins its wheels in the last hour. If this were a mere 90 minute blast it’d probably be the greatest film ever. Monica Bellucci as a secret agent hiding out in a bordello and the sweet posh totty Émilie Dequenne cover over a lot of cracks.

6

Perfect Double Bill: The Monk (2011)

I write regular features about live comedy for British Comedy Guide here https://www.comedy.co.uk/people/bobby_carroll/features/