Crew
Director – Alexander J. Farrell, Screenplay – Greer Taylor Ellison & Alexander J. Farrell, Producers – Alex Chang, Jack Christian, Karl Hall, Ryan Hamilton, Merlin Merton, Martin Owen, Evan Ross, Sebastian Street, Jordan Wagner & Ying Ye, Photography – Daniel Katz, Music – Jack Halama & Nathan Klein, Visual Effects – Alchemy 24, Pixel Bits, Rotomaker & Viridian FX (Supervisor – Ben Louden), Special Effects – Rowley Effects (Supervisor – Rob Rowley), Makeup Design – Malwina Suwinska, Creature Effects – KM Effects, Production Design – Russell De Rozario. Production Company – Paradox House/Future Artists Entertainment.
Cast
Caoilinn Springall (Willow Avery), Kit Harington (Noah Avery), Ashleigh Cummings (Imogen Avery), James Cosmo (Waylon)
Plot
Willow Avery grows up with her father Noah and mother Imogen on a large countryside estate. She is kept inside because of poor health, while the property is surrounded by walls and barred gates. Each month when the full moon comes, her father is taken out into the woods by her mother and chained up. Willow hears of the rumours that he becomes a monster and determines to find out the truth for herself.
The werewolf films has been with us since the 1920s. The work that solidified what the genre was Universal’s The Wolfman (1941) with Lon Chaney Jr, which created all the mythology about full moons and silver bullets. There have been numerous comedies, parodies, monster team-ups and wild conceptual mixes since them, plus a whole other body of films that rework the basics with a top arsenal of makeup effects. The Beast Within came out during a period that saw several high-profile revivals of the genre with Werewolves (2024) and Wolf Man (2025). I have an essay that covers the genre here at Werewolf Films.
The Beast Within starts in a very different way to anything you expect of it. Though Kit Harington as the afflicted father and Ashleigh Cummings as the mother are top billed, it is young Caoilinn Springall who becomes the point-of-view character. We see everything that happens through her eyes, not understanding of what is happening. The film is directed with a quiet intimacy – it often takes place in low voices and silences, voices half-heard through walls.
The slow build and detail of all of this is impeccable – and nowhere through do we get mention of any werewolves. Director Alexander J. Farrell even goes so far as to stray away from showing us what is going on in the forest when Kit Harington is chained up right up until the end. The film makes magnificent use of the surrounding scenery – the sense of an isolated compound surrounded by high walls and a barred gate, the wide-open heaths of the Scottish countryside, the Land Rover cruising through a giant two-level Roman aqueduct stretching overhead.
The major disappointment of The Beast Within is the ending [PLOT SPOILERS] where it appears to be revealed that there is no werewolf. Or maybe not. For reasons unclear, Ashleigh Cummings likes to take Kit Harington out once a month on a full moon and lock him up in chains. We do get some direct transformation scenes towards the end where we see Kit Harington’s body change and the climactic scenes where we see the fully emerged werewolf. However, there is then considerable confusion when we arrive at the end where we are offered an alternate point-of-view through Caoilinn Springall’s eyes where there is no werewolf. You are not quite sure what this means – is the werewolf all in young Caoilinn’s mind? I’ve seen one interpretation that explains the film as a child’s imaginings of an abusive relationship, which makes reasonable sense. On the other hand, this also creates confusions when you try to make sense of the rest of the film –why does an abusive husband mean the family have to lock themselves up in a compound and chain him in the woods? Why does this happen only once a month?
The Beast Within was the first fiction film from British director Alexander J. Farrell who had previously made the documentaries Lighthouse Lesvos (2016), Refugee (2018) and Making a Killing (2023).
The Beast Within is not related and should not be confused with the earlier 1980s monster movie The Beast Within (1982).
Trailer here