''Cry Wolf'' (stylized as ''Cry_Wolf'') is a 2005 American
slasher film
A slasher film is a subgenre of horror films involving a killer or a group of killers stalking and murdering a group of people, usually by use of bladed or sharp tools. Although the term "slasher" may occasionally be used informally as a generic ...
directed by
Jeff Wadlow
Jeffrey Clark Wadlow (born March 2, 1976) is an American screenwriter, producer and director. He's best known for writing, producing and directing feature films, including ''Kick-Ass 2 (film), Kick-Ass 2'' (2013), ''Truth or Dare (2018 film), T ...
and co-written by Wadlow and Beau Bauman. The film stars
Julian Morris
Julian David Morris (born 13 January 1983) is an English actor. After appearing in the British television series '' The Knock'' (1996) and ''Fish'' (2000) during his teenage years, he had his first starring role in the American slasher film '' C ...
,
Jon Bon Jovi
John Francis Bongiovi Jr. (born March 2, 1962), known professionally as Jon Bon Jovi, is an American singer, songwriter, guitarist, and actor. He is best known as the founder and Lead vocalist, frontman of the rock band Bon Jovi, which was fo ...
,
Lindy Booth,
Jared Padalecki
Jared Tristan Padalecki (born July 19, 1982) is an American actor. He is best known for playing the role of Sam Winchester in the TV series ''Supernatural''. He rose to fame in the early 2000s after appearing on the television series '' Gilmore ...
and
Gary Cole
Gary Michael Cole (born September 20, 1956) is an American actor. He began his professional acting career on stage at Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre Company in 1985. His breakout role was playing Jack 'Nighthawk' Killian in the NBC series '' M ...
. It follows a group of teenagers at a remote elite boarding school who play a group
parlor game called
Cry Wolf by spreading rumors of a serial killer nicknamed "The Wolf". This leads to the discovery of a young woman's body on campus, putting the lives of those who played the game in legitimate danger.
''Cry Wolf'' was released in the United States on September 16, 2005, earning $32.5 million worldwide from a $1 million budget. It received largely negative reviews from critics.
Plot
A group of
prep school students consisting of Graham, Mercedes, Lewis, Randall, Regina, Tom, Dodger and Owen play a game called
Cry Wolf, where someone is marked as a "wolf" and the group tries to figure out who it is.
After meeting his new journalism teacher, Mr. Walker, Owen and Tom meet the others for lunch. They discuss the police finding a girl's body, Becky, after it was dragged through the woods by a wolf. The group considers who could have murdered Becky, when Dodger proposes expanding Cry Wolf to the entire school. Owen suggests creating a fake e-mail telling everyone about a
serial killer
A serial killer (also called a serial murderer) is a person who murders three or more people,An offender can be anyone:
*
*
*
*
* (This source only requires two people) with the killings taking place over a significant period of time in separat ...
who goes from campus to campus stalking and killing students. They describe the killer as wearing an orange ski mask, a green camouflage jacket, steel toe combat boots, black tactical leather gloves, brandishing a hunting knife or a high-powered handgun. That night, they send out the e-mail.
The next day, the entire school has spread the story in the e-mail. Owen receives an instant message from someone using the name 'Wolf'. Tom and Owen accuse Dodger, but she claims she was studying with Regina.
Tom and Owen find their dorm room trashed. When the instant messenger comes up on Owen's laptop, they find a piercing stud and blood on Owen's keyboard. Tom blames Regina, who has a recipe for fake blood. When accused, she insists she was on a field trip.
Believing Dodger is lying, Owen confronts her. Dodger informs him that she was visiting her mother. Deciding that Randall is behind the odd behavior, Owen tries tracking him down, to no avail. Owen again seeks out Dodger, and finds her kissing Mr. Walker.
In his journalism class the next day, when Owen reaches into his bag for supplies, a hunting knife falls out. Mr. Walker escorts Owen to the Headmistress's office. Owen tells Mr. Walker that he knows about his relationship with Dodger, and that he will tell the headmistress if Walker reveals the knife. Mr. Walker agrees not to say anything.
On the night of Halloween, 'Wolf' attacks Owen. Thinking Tom was trying to prank him, Owen goes to leave with Tom's car, but sees Wolf behind him. The attacker ends up being Mercedes, who was trying to prove that attackers can be women.
The following day, Owen and Mercedes meet with the headmistress, who decides that Owen's fate will be decided over the weekend. The rest of the group is forced to stay at school over the weekend. Owen contacts them to meet in the chapel. Owen, Dodger, Tom, Lewis and Regina meet and try to get to the bottom of the attacks. While Lewis is on the phone, Mercedes is apparently attacked in the bathroom by Wolf. Lewis runs out as Owen tries to call for help.
Owen, Regina and Tom find Randall's body in a confessional. Owen goes looking for Dodger, and sees Lewis get attacked. Owen runs to the parking lot to see Mr. Walker still on campus. Owen runs to Mr. Walker's office as his phone rings. Owen answers to Dodger crying on the other end; she has found Mercedes dead. Dodger tells Owen she is coming and can see him through the window. He looks out to see Wolf kill her. Afterwards, Mr. Walker enters the room. Upon noticing that Mr. Walker has a jacket, an orange mask and a knife, Owen shoots him. The door is suddenly opened by Dodger, Tom and Regina.
Owen is arrested for murder while the group admits that it was a prank to get Mercedes and Owen back for making them stay on campus. Randall, Mercedes and Lewis are alive and well. Mr. Walker was involved with Becky, the gun in his desk having been used to kill her. Dodger visits Owen, who has been released on bail, and says she would never have played the game if she knew Mr. Walker was cheating on her, revealing she organized everything. Dodger killed Becky because she was jealous of Mr. Walker's relationship with her and had set up the game knowing that Owen would blame Mr. Walker for the killings, thereby killing him and making her happy. Despite Owen threatening to report her, Dodger replies that no one will believe him and leaves.
Cast
Production
In 2002,
Chrysler
FCA US, LLC, Trade name, doing business as Stellantis North America and known historically as Chrysler ( ), is one of the "Big Three (automobile manufacturers), Big Three" automobile manufacturers in the United States, headquartered in Auburn H ...
sponsored an online contest called the Chrysler Million Dollar Film Festival wherein applicants could compete for the chance to win a $1 million production deal with
Universal Pictures
Universal City Studios LLC, doing business as Universal Pictures (also known as Universal Studios or simply Universal), is an American filmmaking, film production and film distribution, distribution company headquartered at the 10 Universal Ci ...
.
The contest began at the
2002 Sundance Film Festival and continued throughout the year at various other film festivals until
2002 Cannes Film Festival
The 55th Cannes Film Festival took place from 15 to 26 May 2002. American filmmaker David Lynch served as jury president for the main competition. Virginie Ledoyen hosted the opening and closing ceremonies.
French-Polish filmmaker Roman Polanski ...
wherein 10 semifinalists created short films that had to prominently feature Chrysler automobiles.
Five finalists then were allowed to spend the Summer working with film industry veterans in crafting a
pitch to showcase at the
2002 Toronto Film Festival.
In September 2002, a panel consisting of
Doug Liman
Douglas Eric Liman (; born July 24, 1965) is an American film director and producer. He is known for directing the films '' Swingers'' (1996), '' Go'' (1999), '' The Bourne Identity'' (2002), '' Mr. & Mrs. Smith'' (2005), '' Jumper'' (2008), '' E ...
,
Freeman Thomas, and executives from Universal and
Rogue Pictures
Rogue (originally Rogue Pictures) is an American independent production company founded in 1998 by Matt Wall and Patrick Gunn, originally started off as a genre film label of the Universal-affiliated independent film studio October Films and was ...
determined then recent
USC School of Cinematic Arts
The USC School of Cinematic Arts is an academic unit of the University of Southern California, in Los Angeles, California, Los Angeles. With a history that dates to the first years of Sound film, talkies, the school descends from America's first ...
graduate
Jeff Wadlow
Jeffrey Clark Wadlow (born March 2, 1976) is an American screenwriter, producer and director. He's best known for writing, producing and directing feature films, including ''Kick-Ass 2 (film), Kick-Ass 2'' (2013), ''Truth or Dare (2018 film), T ...
winner of the contest on the basis of his submitted short film ''Tower of Babel'' which he had created with classmate Beau Bauman and his pitch then titled ''Living the Lie'' which was described as a modern day retelling of ''
The Boy Who Cried Wolf
The Boy Who Cried Wolf is one of Aesop's Fables, numbered 210 in the Perry Index. From it is derived the English idiom "to cry wolf", defined as "to give a false alarm" in ''Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable'' and glossed by the ''Oxford E ...
''.
Release
America Online
AOL (formerly a company known as AOL Inc. and originally known as America Online) is an American web portal and online service provider based in New York City, and a brand marketed by Yahoo! Inc. (2017–present), Yahoo! Inc.
The service tra ...
also helped publicizing the film in July/August 2005; launching an
alternate reality game
An alternate reality game (ARG) is an interactive networked narrative that uses the real world as a platform and employs transmedia storytelling to deliver a story that may be altered by players' ideas or actions.
The form is defined by int ...
for
AIM
AIM or Aim may refer to:
Computing
* AIM alliance, an Apple-IBM-Motorola alliance
* AIM (software), AOL Instant Messenger
* Fortyfive, a Japanese software development company previously known as AIM
Military
* Abrams Integrated Management, an ...
users to play by sending instant messages to each other, which ran for the duration of the film's promotion. The game itself ran similarly to the popular game '
Mafia
"Mafia", as an informal or general term, is often used to describe criminal organizations that bear a strong similarity to the Sicilian Mafia, original Mafia in Sicily, to the Italian-American Mafia, or to other Organized crime in Italy, organiz ...
'; just replacing townspeople and mafia with sheep and wolves. The film was released theatrically in the United States on September 16, 2005.
At the box office, ''Cry Wolf'' grossed $10 million in the US and $22.5 million internationally, for a worldwide total of $32.5 million.
[
]
Reception
Film review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator, review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee ...
reported an approval rating of 22% based on , and a rating average of 4/10. The website's critics consensus reads: "Dull and derivative, ''Cry_Wolf'' is a subpar slasher that even ardent fans of the genre may find difficult to enjoy." The website Metacritic
Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...
gave the film a weighted average score of 39 out of 100 based on , indicating "generally unfavorable" reviews. Audiences polled by CinemaScore
CinemaScore is an American market research firm based in Las Vegas. It surveys film audiences to rate their viewing experiences with letter grades, reports the results, and forecasts box office receipts from the data.
Background
Ed Mintz, who ...
gave the film an average grade of "B−" on an A+ to F scale.
Writing for the magazine ''Variety
Variety may refer to:
Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats
* Variety (radio)
* Variety show, in theater and television
Films
* ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont
* ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...
'', John Anderson said that "there are surprises intrinsic to the storyline .., but adding that "there’s not enough tension to make the viewer care that much for the various hoaxes and faux-slayings perpetrated by the film’s largely unlikable gang of privileged brats. In an era of increasingly sophisticated thrillers, “Cry Wolf" is a bit antique.", Anderson concluded.
Ryan Larson, of the website Bloody Disgusting
Bloody Disgusting is an American independent multi-media company, which began as a horror genre-focused news website specializing in information services that covered various horror media. The company expanded into other media including podcast ...
, praised the performance of Jon Bon Jovi
John Francis Bongiovi Jr. (born March 2, 1962), known professionally as Jon Bon Jovi, is an American singer, songwriter, guitarist, and actor. He is best known as the founder and Lead vocalist, frontman of the rock band Bon Jovi, which was fo ...
and said that "diving deep into the production of this film is fascinating" and added that "''Cry Wolf'' feels so 2000s in all the best and worst ways", but concluded that "being the mid-2000s, however, the film is also bogged down with homophobia
Homophobia encompasses a range of negative attitudes and feelings toward homosexuality or people who identify or are perceived as being lesbian, Gay men, gay or bisexual. It has been defined as contempt, prejudice, aversion, hatred, or ant ...
and some outdated terminology that will make you cringe when watching."
In January 2023, Stacey Grant of teen magazine
Teen magazines are magazines aimed at teenager, teenage readers. They usually consist of gossip, news, fashion tips and interviews and may include posters, label, stickers, small samples of cosmetics or other products and inserts.
The teen maga ...
''Seventeen'' ranked ''Cry Wolf'' as the eighth best teen movie of the 2000s out of seventeen films.
See also
* List of films set around Halloween
This is a list of films set on or around Halloween.
Children's and family
* '' A-Haunting We Will Go'' (1966)
* '' The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad'' (1949)
* '' The Addams Family'' (1991)
* '' The Addams Family'' (2019)
* '' Alpha and Ome ...
References
External links
*
*
''Cry Wolf'' at AllMovie
*
*
*
{{Authority control
2005 films
2005 horror films
2000s teen horror films
2000s slasher films
American slasher films
American teen horror films
Films set in boarding schools
2000s English-language films
Films about pranks
Films directed by Jeff Wadlow
Films with screenplays by Jeff Wadlow
Films scored by Michael Wandmacher
Films shot in Virginia
Rogue (company) films
Relativity Media films
2005 directorial debut films
2000s American films
English-language horror films