Hyenas (2011)
7/10
Clever and original, but flawed creature feature
6 March 2014
Following a series of grisly murders, a hunter and his protégée team up together to find the culprit terrorizing their small town and set out to stop the vicious shape-shifting creatures responsible from continuing their rampage.

This turned out to be quite an enjoyable effort. One of the better elements is the new and somewhat original take on werewolves provided here where they're not portrayed as typical humans but more like rabid animals with the unique ability to shape-shift rather than be afflicted with a curse or other such condition. That, combined with their obvious pack-like attitude, creative back-story and absolutely cruel viciousness makes for an absolutely appealing creature that gets a lot right here, including times where it really drives up the tension as they stalk their prey or simply engage in stealth tactics to force their victims into a deadly situation. As well, there's a lot of rather fun confrontations here with the creatures including the opening encounter at the highway trap, the forest shoot-out that initially encourages belief in their existence for the skeptical aide and the garage encounter that really serves as the film's biggest and most chilling sequence as the trapped victim slowly realizes his doom in the darkened garage and slowly goes insane with their tormenting before springing the final trap. It's repeated to nice success during the woodland encounter but just doesn't have the same impact as earlier, and thankfully the final encounter at the house is where it gets to the highest mark with a spectacular assault on both sides from the creatures and the hunters' defenses coming into solid showings. There's still a few flaws here, including the absolutely inane CGI for the creatures in their animal form which looks inherently fake and quite laughable due to the rather distracting nature it implies throughout the scene. As well, the fact that it tends to employ a few extra plot lines that aren't needed is a little confusing which spreads the film out a little longer than it really should be, but overall there's a lot to like here if the flaws aren't too damaging.

Rated R: Graphic Language, Graphic Violence, Full Nudity and minor drug use.
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