100% Wolf

Directed by Alexs Stadermann, 100% Wolf follows Ilai Swindells’ Freddy Lupin, the heir to a werewolf pack, as he’s forced to step up and prove himself after his werewolf alter ego turns out to be a far-from-threatening poodle. It’s a kid-friendly premise that’s employed to entirely innocuous (and progressively tedious) effect by Stadermann, as the filmmaker, working from Alexia Gates-Foale and Barbara Stephen’s screenplay, delivers a briskly-paced animated comedy that contains few elements designed to capture and sustain the interest of older viewers – with the colorful animation and strong voice work ultimately going a long way, at least initially, towards staving off one’s total boredom. The somewhat tolerable atmosphere takes a serious hit from a repetitive and hopelessly underwhelming midsection detailing Freddy’s exploits within a broadly-conceived pound, and there’s little doubt, as well, that the exhaustingly frenetic and frantic climax ensures that the whole thing ends on a decidedly interminable note – which does, in the final analysis, cement 100% Wolf‘s place as a mostly intolerable children’s film that admittedly might amuse very small (and undemanding) toddlers.

*1/2 out of ****