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Ginger Snaps Back: The Beginning (2004)

http://www.mosaic-entertainment.co.uk

Dir: Grant Harvey

This, the second sequel to "Ginger Snaps", is actually a prequel that shows us the origin of the Werewolf 'Curse' on the ill-fated Fitzgerald Sisters, Brigitte and Ginger.

1815, the Canadian wilderness. Ginger (Katharine Isabelle) and her Sister Brigitte (Emily Perkins) are riding through the harsh, winter shrouded land in search of shelter.
They come upon a ripped up Indian encampment and an Old Indian Woman (Edna Rain) tells them "Kill the boy, or one Sister kills the other". Before they can question this bizarre prediction their horse bolts and. Chasing after it, Brigitte gets her leg trapped in a snare.
An Indian hunter (Nathaniel Arcand) sets Brigitte free and leads them back to 'Fort Bailey', an outpost that relies on fur trading for supplies, but the last party of traders have failed to return, and provisions are low.

The girls discover that Werewolves are besieging their refuge, and the continuous attacks are not only taking their toll on the men's numbers but also creating dangerous internal conflicts.
The commanding officer Wallace Rowlands (Tom McCamus) saves the Sisters from being cast out by
Sgt Major James (JR Bourne), a ruthless, racist, bully, and the scared girls try to get used to their new surroundings.
One night though Ginger is bitten by the commanding officer's young son Geoffrey (Stevie Mitchell), who has been bitten by a Werewolf himself, and the horror that will live with the Sisters throughout the centuries, begins….

 

The beautiful, atmospheric cinematography by Michael Marshall captures the cold land, in all it's snow-clad wonder, perfectly and as such the movie opens very strongly indeed. In fact this is easily the most visually impressive entry in the series and hides it's low budget origins very well thanks to the impressive Fort Bailey set, the costumes, and the attention to detail in the set design.

But the film that these visuals shroud is sadly not all it could and should have been.
The biggest problem here is that the Sisters, and Ginger's plight itself, are pretty much equal in screen time to the besieged fort plot and the host of other characters. They are still the main focus, but we don't feel as strongly for their problems and their fate than we did in the first film as we get to know them less before, and also during, Ginger's change.
The movie is really just a succession of repeated sequences; someone sneaking around before being attacked, Ginger getting worse, the odd bit of philosophical banter, and a spot of internal conflict.
But the story itself never really moves forward and evolves, and an hour along and nothing has really changed since Ginger was bitten 25 minutes in.
And that the movie lacks the irony, metaphor and subtext of the original, has a much more subdued relationship between the Sisters and plays down the personal effects the changes have on Ginger, does not help matters either.

The other members of the Fort are all pretty standard fare, the 'Fire and Brimstone' Reverend Gilbert (Hugh Dillon), the tired old Doc Murphy (Matthew Walker) the kindly but tragic commander, the cruel Sgt. Major etc etc. All are played well enough by the actors though, with JR Bourne particularly giving a strong showing.

The only really complex character is 'The Hunter' and Nathaniel Arcand makes for a visually striking presence and plays off the hatred of Bourne's Sgt. James very well in an excellently staged flare-up of violence during dinner.
Ginger and Brigitte are pretty much the same as we have come to know them only there is less to them. Both Perkins and Isabelle do a solid job, but neither is given any real stand-out scenes to really shine like they did in the original film. Although Ginger's latter sequences are quite powerful and Isabelle shows what a real presence she can be.

As with almost everything involving Indians in cinema there are many deep spiritual conversations and mystical visuals to contend with. Some of these sequences offer up a few choice visuals and FX (Brigitte's huge iris's are a wonderful image) but there are still many 'worthy and meaningful' clichés here and it can get a bit much at times.
These scenes do emphasize the idea of a generational 'Curse' on the Sisters though, something that changes the whole set-up of the first film because now it seems that Ginger was predestined to be bitten by the Werewolf, just like her ancestor we are following now, in this movie.

An aspect where the Werewolf lore differs from the original is that it is here believed that killing the Werewolf that bit you, before the full change, will reverse the curse. But it's a confused revelation and plays little part in the story as the film progresses.
In fact the haphazard nature of the screenplay (by Stephen Massicotte and Christina Ray) is probably because of the rushed shooting schedule as "Ginger Snaps Back" was started almost on the heels of the first sequel "Ginger Snaps Unleashed". The haste shows and it's a shame that more time was not given to fine tune the screenplay.

But despite these large flaws there is still a lot to enjoy here for fans of the series.
There's a nice mix of tragedy and black humour in a scene where Brigitte takes the bitten Ginger to see Doc Murphy just as he's in the middle of blowing the head off a poor young man who was himself bitten the night before. To say that they have second thoughts when the good Doctor says "and what can I do for you two", is an understatement!

The Werewolves themselves are better looking (in no small thanks to them actually having a lot of fur this time) than in the first film and make for effectively powerful looking beasts.
And thankfully they are all real on-set creations with no CGI. They still look a bit ragged at times (even slightly goofy thanks to the overly long front legs) but this is a big improvement over the original FX.
There are also some effectively subtle visual effects on Ginger's eyes as she changes, and combined with Isabelle's striking looks they give a genuine feeling of power as she gets closer to becoming the beast.

There are some moist and ferocious kills during the finale, with a nice spurting throat wound especially, but the gore is at a minimum otherwise as once again the bloodletting is carefully used to punctuate the narrative and thus becomes more of a jolt to the viewer when it occurs.

So "Ginger Snaps Back: The Beginning" is a nice idea for a movie, and it looks striking. But this is a case of an overly hasty production (hey, lets call it what it is…money grabbing) that has damaged the finished product resulting in a film that lacks the emotion, the subtext and the tragic charm of the original.
Worth a look for fans, but it ultimately frustrates as there is a really good film fighting to get out from under the messy, characterless screenplay and laboured direction.

 

'Mosaic Entertainment' have delivered a very nice looking anamorphic transfer, a thumping 5:1 sound mix and some mildly interesting, if sparse, extras.
These extras are the excellent Theatrical trailer, some dialogue heavy deleted scenes, a pretty interesting (if abrupt) 'Director's Video Diary' and a brief look (with behind the scenes footage) at the make-up used to create the feral child, Geoffrey.

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