Don't go into Wolf Man expecting everything to be explained with a "library montage", as its director wanted to "keep things more mysterious"

The latest entry in the updated Universal Monsterverse, Wolf Man, might not lay everything out for you when you see it in cinemas.

A lot of big movies these days definitely have a big issue with explaining everything that happened so the audience can understand the whole thing, but that's often the detriment to the quality of the film. Wolf Man director Leigh Whannell is hoping to do away with that typical use of exposition in his version of the 1941 classic monster movie, which is due out this week, January 17. The director recently spoke with GamesRadar about the upcoming film, where he explained that he "wanted to focus on the family" more instead of explaining how werewolves work or anything like that.

"I didn't want that scene where they discover a dusty book in the basement like, 'Here's the rules'," Whannell explained. "The library montage, you might call it... where you figure everything out. Exposition is such a tricky thing to handle, and how much you want to explain to people. A lot of times you might do a test screening and people tell you they want more, but my personal preference is to keep things more mysterious."

The director cited the works of David Lynch as a point of inspiration, not for their content necessarily, but how unwilling they are to explain anything. "They're like these puzzle boxes and [Lynch] deliberately avoids explanations. I find that makes the film stay with me, because nothing was spoon fed. I can walk away and live with the movie, and interpret it, then I'll get online. I'm like anyone else, I've googled 'What does Mulholland Drive mean?' I'm seeking an answer, and I think that's what he wants with his movies. I'm not saying these are David Lynch movies that I'm making, but I like being sparing with that stuff."

This is Whannell's second time making a monster movie for Universal, having previously released the quite good The Invisible Man back in 2020. Now we just have to see if he can go two for two on monster movies!