The Company of Wolves (1984) on Netflix
Rosaleen dreams of a forest village where wolves chase her sister Alice. Her grandmother knits her a red shawl and warns her against trusting a man whose brows meet.
- Netflix3.0/5
- IMDb6.6/1021,286 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes85%
Trailer
Plot summary
Rosaleen, a young girl, dozes off in a country manor and dreams that she lives in a forest village in a late 18th-century world with her parents and her sister Alice. Wolves chase Alice and kill her, and while her parents mourn, Rosaleen stays with her grandmother, who knits her a red shawl and warns her against wandering off the path, against eating fallen apples, and against men with meeting brows. In the village, an amorous boy pursues her.
Cast
- Shane Johnstoneas Amorous Boy
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Company of Wolves (1984)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Sarah Patterson, who plays Rosaleen, was turned away from her own London premiere: the film carried an 18 certificate and its teenage star was too young to be let in.
- Most of the wolf pack is not wolves at all. Budget limits and worries about the cast's safety meant Belgian Shepherd Dogs, mainly Tervuerens and Groenendaels, were dyed to pass as wolves, and careful lighting angles made the eyes of both the dogs and the real animals glow.
- Neil Jordan said on the DVD commentary that the money was so tight he had to conjure an entire fairytale forest out of what amounted to "twelve trees", yet still got a sunless, claustrophobic world out of it.
- Jordan wanted an erotic forest and said production designer Anton Furst understood at once; the pair studied the paintings of Samuel Palmer before building the set at Shepperton.
- Sarah Patterson landed the lead although she was far younger than the actress the casting director had in mind, and probably too young to grasp some of the material; her school had to release her for nine weeks of shooting.
SPOILER
Angela Carter's original ending had Rosaleen dive into her bedroom floor as if into water, the boards rippling shut behind her. Jordan could not work out how to shoot it on the budget and always regretted ending on a scream instead.
