When a strange werewolf virus threatens to decimate first New York and then the world, a rogue general uses the disease to create an army of supersoldiers. Battledogs movie clips: BUY THE MOVIE: Don't miss the HOTTEST NEW TRAILERS: CLIP DESCRIPTION: C.
She carried on her work as a child star in Boy Meets World and made TV movie Battledogs in 2013. Video Unavailable. Kelly Osbourne's body transformation as she celebrates. Battledogs (Werewolf Transformation) I had very low expectations for Battledogs -after all, it's a 'SyFy Original Movie.' And, truth be told, I fast-forwarded through most of it (life is short, so sue me). Apr 06, 2013 Directed by Alexander Yellen. With Craig Sheffer, Dennis Haysbert, Kate Vernon, Ariana Richards. A werewolf virus is unleashed upon New York, and Major Hoffman looks for a cure while Lt. General Monning wants to establish a new canine army.
'Battledogs,'is a film that demonstrates the fine art of retooling a movie and having a good time doing it. In this instance, Writer Phillip Van Dyke retreads 2008's 'The Incredible Hulk' but tailors it more for werewolves. Every plot device and moment in the film is shamelessly derived from the 2008 action film. Hell, there's even a moment where one of the infected humans is kicked out of a helicopter in mid-air and sent crashing in to the Earth as it transforms in to the rabid werewolf.
Like the aforementioned film there's a genetic infection that can be spawned when its host becomes stressed or angry, there's a clandestine government who wants to use the infection as a means of manufacturing it as a ware weapon, while a single human believes the infected individuals should be treated like humans despite their abilities to wreak havoc when enraged. Instead of a young woman, Craig Scheffer plays up the role of Betty Ross as Brian Hoffman, a CDC expert who garners a military background but still holds pity for the monsters. A now fully grown Ariana Richards (Jurassic Park) is a female Bruce Banner named instead Donna Voorhees. Hotel arts calgary. After returning from Canada with a bitten arm from a mysterious wolf, Donna transforms in to a werewolf in the middle of an airport and massacres an entire group of hapless travelers. Those who don't die from the attacks are infected and become werewolves when they're enraged, stressed, or emotional.
Battle Dogs Transformation
Voorhees feels she can control it and wants to be thought of as human, but the evil government won't allow it. Dennis Haysbert plays up the Thunderbolt Ross role as Lt. General Christopher Monning, a scowling soldier who considers the infected void of any rights and wants to use them as weapons and soldiers in the battlefield by command of the government. The derivations continue as Hoffman tries to reach Voorhees and help her control her anger in hopes of gaining control of her transformations, while villainous Monning rubs his hands together and insists on capturing Voorhees and using her blood to synthesize a formula that will give American troops some sort of advantage on the field involving the positive traits of lycanthropy. The similarities are remarkable and I'm assuming not at all coincidental. There's even a moment where Monning purposely pisses off Voorhees allowing her to transform and she's brought back to human form thanks to the utter kindness of Hoffman.
And of course, like Abomination, the werewolves are what happens when you use the infection for nefarious purposes. True, I mock and patronize, but 'Battledogs' could be so much worse. With a more unique spin on the premise, the concept is ripe with entertainment value as a raucous time killer. The special effects are tolerable for most part, opting for the four legged werewolf variety, while director Alexander Yellen assembles a really good cast of actors. From Richards, Scheffer, and Haysbert, there's also a cameo from Bill Duke (easiest role in the film), a small role from Ernie Hudson as captain deus ex machina, and Wes Studi as Monning's subservient sidekick. The lovely Kate Vernon is also memorable as the noble doctor Gordon who is torn between hating and empathizing for the werewolf hordes.
Surely it's a B grade science fiction horror hybrid so there are moments of inherent silliness including human rights protestors at what is supposed to be a top secret facility for the werewolves, and soldiers battling the massive werewolves with small dart guns rather than high tech trapping weapons that could bring them down with ease. In either case, Ariana Richards does a great job as Voorhees giving her character a heart. It's tough to hate anything Richards is in, and she tends to rise above the camp. Scheffer also does a respectable job as the humanitarian Hoffman who struggles to bring this rapidly chaotic situation to a peaceful resolve, knowing it will likely end horribly for everyone. The main caveat of 'Battle Dogs' is the ending is so abrupt and ultimately unsatisfying.
Granted, 'It's been a hell of a day' is a nice hero one-liner for Scheffer, but when all is said and done, aren't he and the doctor fugitives from the American government or something? Oh screw it, I just want to see more of Ariana Richards. In spite of being a shameless re-working of 'The Incredible Hulk,' Director Yellen takes a creative premise and turns it in to an entertaining B movie with a very good cast of genre notables. With more re-tooling, a better studio, and a bigger budget this could be a hell of a great movie.
Battledogs (made for TV 2013) specifically Syfy.
Knowing the above let's keep everything in mind.
The Good:
-Werewolves invade New York
-There's a lot of werewolves
-some transformation scenes
-occasional physical effects (make up, animatronics, etc.)
-Has Ernie Hudson (Ghostbusters) and Ariana Richards (girls from Jurassic Park)
-We get to see Ariana Richards and how her acting career has gone.
The Bad:
-We get to see where Ariana Richards career has gone. *laughs*
-CGI as only the Asylum can do
-cliche military sub plot
-cliche acting
-numerous timing problems
Firstly expectations for this were pretty low given that IT IS a Syfy original AND an Asylum production. The biggest problem with this film is that sadly it is a SYFY original. If a big movie budget had been given and a longer run time it probably would have been at the very least tolerable and awesome in scale. However the restrictions of television production become imediately known as you treated to a scene from 'JFK airport'. It so isn't. For anyone who has been there you know immediately that the airport in question is not JFK. That suspension of disbelief aside the plot is pretty straight forward. A wild life photographer is a carrier of a virus (Lupine virus -10 points for originality) and the outbreak occurs in the airport with people getting killed and infected all over. The government sets up a quarantine the infected in a what I assume is a facility but it's look of an abandon train station keeps me thinking this is a rushed job and this leads to a problem. Outside the facility people are protesting saying the infected (werewolves) should be released because they are human. However throughout the film we get the sense that this just happened. In fact when one of the main characters goes back to the original scene of the crime there's still bodies and blood marks everywhere. Yet the government had time to set up a quarantine place, ID the werewolves with apparent 100% accuracy, and enough time for the general public to find out about all this to protest the injustice.
Soon Major Hoffman (Craig Shaffer) meets (although he does not know it) patient zero, cause after zombie outbreaks there's always one of those. They bond for all of five seconds and soon Hoffman crosses paths with the General (Dennis Haysbert ) whose planning the use said werewolves as military soldiers while making a brief but never fully realized argument about the follies of modern technology versus men in boots. The rest of the film has Hoffman along with a CDC nurse trying to find patient zero and extracting the antibody from her to get a cure all while racing against the clock as the once imprisoned werewolves eventually escape into the city. A nuke is called in just to add to the tension but fear not it is all wrapped up in under five minutes, seriously.
What should be a fairly straight forward race against the clock or werewolves running amok gets so many of the cliche plot points SYFy just seems to not be able to let go. President ordering nukes on a city as a last minute deterrent, finding the deux ex machina solution, and an evil military subplot all detract from what could have been an awesome idea. As mentioned above timing of everything seems off in this film. From the time it takes to nuke New York (a decision made WAAAAAAAAY too lightly by a very ineffectively acted President), to the werewolves fast and yet slow trek across New York City, the way too sudden two romantic relationships in the film, and finally the extremely rushed end. The CGI is almost laughable. The werewolves appear disjointed and in some scenes you wonder where the neck is on some of them but the bad CGI doesn't stop there it is randomly inserted into areas of the film that were quite needless, CGI fog, a CGI plane, and several of the actors CGI in, it's like the computer animator just went crazy. What physical effects there are get little screen time and are mostly seen in the beginning rapidly replaced by computer animation later on.
The biggest problem, patient zero. I don't mean Ariana Richards acting either. How did she become patient zero? She was a wildlife photographer, specialty wolves. One would assume she got too close to a werewolf and bitten. After all it makes sense right? WRONG! She got bit by a common wolf, whose fang gets some how lodged into her arm. I didn't think wolves teeth came off like a sharks but apparently they do. Worry not for the cure is actually antibodies in the fang which also caused the virus in the first place. So for anyone wanting to become a werewolf just go out photograph a wolf and try to get it's teeth stuck in your body..yeah ok. The end doesn't make sense either. Werewolves running around and the cure is now in some abandoned part of New York because that's where the nuke (a seemingly just giant black smoke cloud) went off and where Major Hoffman and CDC woman find themselves with the fang. No needles, no medical facilities, werewolves still running around in urbania. Don't worry the military has blown up the bridges out of New York, in the slowest possible way ever, but seemingly fails to bomb or do anything with subway tunnels, rail tracks, etc. just roads. Yep it's a good day for werewolves.
Surely it's a B grade science fiction horror hybrid so there are moments of inherent silliness including human rights protestors at what is supposed to be a top secret facility for the werewolves, and soldiers battling the massive werewolves with small dart guns rather than high tech trapping weapons that could bring them down with ease. In either case, Ariana Richards does a great job as Voorhees giving her character a heart. It's tough to hate anything Richards is in, and she tends to rise above the camp. Scheffer also does a respectable job as the humanitarian Hoffman who struggles to bring this rapidly chaotic situation to a peaceful resolve, knowing it will likely end horribly for everyone. The main caveat of 'Battle Dogs' is the ending is so abrupt and ultimately unsatisfying.
Granted, 'It's been a hell of a day' is a nice hero one-liner for Scheffer, but when all is said and done, aren't he and the doctor fugitives from the American government or something? Oh screw it, I just want to see more of Ariana Richards. In spite of being a shameless re-working of 'The Incredible Hulk,' Director Yellen takes a creative premise and turns it in to an entertaining B movie with a very good cast of genre notables. With more re-tooling, a better studio, and a bigger budget this could be a hell of a great movie.
Battledogs (made for TV 2013) specifically Syfy.
Knowing the above let's keep everything in mind.
The Good:
-Werewolves invade New York
-There's a lot of werewolves
-some transformation scenes
-occasional physical effects (make up, animatronics, etc.)
-Has Ernie Hudson (Ghostbusters) and Ariana Richards (girls from Jurassic Park)
-We get to see Ariana Richards and how her acting career has gone.
The Bad:
-We get to see where Ariana Richards career has gone. *laughs*
-CGI as only the Asylum can do
-cliche military sub plot
-cliche acting
-numerous timing problems
Firstly expectations for this were pretty low given that IT IS a Syfy original AND an Asylum production. The biggest problem with this film is that sadly it is a SYFY original. If a big movie budget had been given and a longer run time it probably would have been at the very least tolerable and awesome in scale. However the restrictions of television production become imediately known as you treated to a scene from 'JFK airport'. It so isn't. For anyone who has been there you know immediately that the airport in question is not JFK. That suspension of disbelief aside the plot is pretty straight forward. A wild life photographer is a carrier of a virus (Lupine virus -10 points for originality) and the outbreak occurs in the airport with people getting killed and infected all over. The government sets up a quarantine the infected in a what I assume is a facility but it's look of an abandon train station keeps me thinking this is a rushed job and this leads to a problem. Outside the facility people are protesting saying the infected (werewolves) should be released because they are human. However throughout the film we get the sense that this just happened. In fact when one of the main characters goes back to the original scene of the crime there's still bodies and blood marks everywhere. Yet the government had time to set up a quarantine place, ID the werewolves with apparent 100% accuracy, and enough time for the general public to find out about all this to protest the injustice.
Soon Major Hoffman (Craig Shaffer) meets (although he does not know it) patient zero, cause after zombie outbreaks there's always one of those. They bond for all of five seconds and soon Hoffman crosses paths with the General (Dennis Haysbert ) whose planning the use said werewolves as military soldiers while making a brief but never fully realized argument about the follies of modern technology versus men in boots. The rest of the film has Hoffman along with a CDC nurse trying to find patient zero and extracting the antibody from her to get a cure all while racing against the clock as the once imprisoned werewolves eventually escape into the city. A nuke is called in just to add to the tension but fear not it is all wrapped up in under five minutes, seriously.
What should be a fairly straight forward race against the clock or werewolves running amok gets so many of the cliche plot points SYFy just seems to not be able to let go. President ordering nukes on a city as a last minute deterrent, finding the deux ex machina solution, and an evil military subplot all detract from what could have been an awesome idea. As mentioned above timing of everything seems off in this film. From the time it takes to nuke New York (a decision made WAAAAAAAAY too lightly by a very ineffectively acted President), to the werewolves fast and yet slow trek across New York City, the way too sudden two romantic relationships in the film, and finally the extremely rushed end. The CGI is almost laughable. The werewolves appear disjointed and in some scenes you wonder where the neck is on some of them but the bad CGI doesn't stop there it is randomly inserted into areas of the film that were quite needless, CGI fog, a CGI plane, and several of the actors CGI in, it's like the computer animator just went crazy. What physical effects there are get little screen time and are mostly seen in the beginning rapidly replaced by computer animation later on.
The biggest problem, patient zero. I don't mean Ariana Richards acting either. How did she become patient zero? She was a wildlife photographer, specialty wolves. One would assume she got too close to a werewolf and bitten. After all it makes sense right? WRONG! She got bit by a common wolf, whose fang gets some how lodged into her arm. I didn't think wolves teeth came off like a sharks but apparently they do. Worry not for the cure is actually antibodies in the fang which also caused the virus in the first place. So for anyone wanting to become a werewolf just go out photograph a wolf and try to get it's teeth stuck in your body..yeah ok. The end doesn't make sense either. Werewolves running around and the cure is now in some abandoned part of New York because that's where the nuke (a seemingly just giant black smoke cloud) went off and where Major Hoffman and CDC woman find themselves with the fang. No needles, no medical facilities, werewolves still running around in urbania. Don't worry the military has blown up the bridges out of New York, in the slowest possible way ever, but seemingly fails to bomb or do anything with subway tunnels, rail tracks, etc. just roads. Yep it's a good day for werewolves.
Battle Dogs Transformation
Lastly I can't help but compare this to 'City Under the Moon' by Hugh Sterbakov. In fact the initial similarities are striking but as the film goes on you quickly see the missed opportunities that the book offers. I would recommend reading City Under the Moon as it deals with the idea of a werewolf out break far more effectively than Battledogs could ever hope. I would recommend this film as a group effort with friends, I imagine giving this film MST3K treatment would be the best way to see it. Overall it is a quick enjoyable film if you turn your brain off and try to ignore the bad CGI.
Battledogs Transformation Scene
I give it a 3 out of 5 mostly for effort as you can tell someone WANTED to do this, but just lacked the resources needed for the scale of it also Ernie Hudson. :)
