Cinema’s thirst for co-opting and demonising everything in the animal kingdom that walks, crawls, swims or slithers and turning them into voracious engines of man mauling destruction will seemingly never be sated. But while the majority of these sorts of projects tend to focus on the more obvious examples, such as sharks, crocodiles and gators, it’s always nice when a filmmaker settles on a lesser utilised critter to spread death and destruction.
However, with all of nature’s heavy hitters already repeatedly claimed (and in some cases, whacked out of their skulls on drugs), there’s a danger that anyone who chooses any of the animals that are left may be scraping the bottom of the food chain barrel. This leads us to Coyotes, a film about – well, you can probably guess what it’s about – but will this darkly humorous tale manage to do for this species of canine, what everyone other famous animal attack flick had done for their favoured beastie?
In the Los Angeles hills, residents are starting to notice that the increase in forest fires is causing coyotes to not only migrate into more heavily populated areas, but to up their predator game in order to keep sourcing food. While that used to just spell bad news for local pets, matters get way more serious when the titular canines start targeting the owners too and we soon witness them sink their teeth into a social media obsessed bimbo and thus expand their prey.
Meanwhile, workaholic graphic novel artist, Scott, is ploughing all of his energies into his job while his wife, Liv, quietly worries that he’s not dedicating his time toward her or their increasingly moody daughter, Chloe, who has reaches that period of teendom where parents are nothing more than an embarrassment. However, with the added stress of having to deal with an eccentric exterminator due to rats in the walls, and a storm that manages to knock out most of their power, both Scott and his family discover that they’ve much more serious problems when a pack of ballsy coyotes target them and their neighbours and refuses to leave. With absolutely no survival skills to speak of and an erratic, drug-fueled neighbour and his prostitute to deal with, Scott and Liv have to lock metaphorical horns with the snarling mutts as the food chain decides to go all squirrely on them, but as the night progresses, yet more threats stack up against them.
Killer coyotes may be a relatively new thing around LA, but raging, out of control fires certainly aren’t, and with their neighbour’s abode going up like a bonfire, the survivors need to work out where to stick some well placed bullets (not to mention a string of well-timed wisecracks) if they’re going to live to tell the tale…
Taking a more Cocaine Bear route with its tone rather than going down a more serious, Jaws-esque route, there was a feeling that Coyotes could have been a diverting slice of Saturday night fun that comes with all the thrills and spills you’d expect from a movie featuring Justin Long as a hapless, quip spewing father. Pumping the breaks just before it enters the deep, madcap waters of the likes of Piranha 3D, Coyotes strives to admirably keep its mangy villains dead serious while allowing a cast full of weirdos to flounder around while they’re picked apart. However, while director Colin (Grave Encounters) Minihan needs to be commended for his left-field choice of animal and how they intertwine with the continuing issues of LA’s habit of exploding into flames at the drop of a hat, the balance of humour and horror seems to be distractingly off.
For a start, I have to give a genuine thumbs up to some pretty good production values that not only add some life to the typical killer animal beats, but also provide some impressively passable CG coyotes despite the fact that they look like their coats are weirdly glossy. But aside from the fact that these vicious bastards look like they’ve been praying on some luxurious dog food along with a myriad of dog walkers and random pets, Minihan seems to not be able to fully get the hang of blending genuine laughs with relatable scares. For a start, the majority of the exaggerated cast members, such as Keir O’Donnell’s obsessive exterminator; Norbert Leo Butz’s frazzled, gun totting next door neighbour and Brittany Allen’s self obsessed prostitute simply aren’t as funny as the director thinks they are and while they get ample opportunity to chew the scenery before the coyotes chew on them, none of are particularly hilarious or memorable.
Additionally, while the coyotes themselves boast above average visuals and get to inflict some gory deaths here and there, the movie never really let’s them fully cut loose in the way that the similarly-themed Primate (frenzied animal, plush house) managed. While that movie found numerous ways for its villainous chimp to bring the pain in ways that made it genuinely fun and exciting, Coyotes remains strangely unadventurous when it comes to its fatal maulings.
The final strike is that if your comedy is only mildly amusing and your horror lacks a bit of bite, you’d better make sure that your film at least has it’s audience biting it’s nails in excitement, but once again, Minihan seems confused about how far he should or shouldn’t be taking things. Maybe he should’ve gone full Piranha 3D, maybe he should’ve gone more serious, who knows? But if it wasn’t for the central presence of Justin Long, it’s a certainty that Coyotes would have had to slink off with its tail firmly between his legs.
While Long (acting opposite his real-life spouse, Kate Bosworth) normally would be playing one of the exaggerated, obnoxious side characters and beckoning a horrible, cinematic fate, his graduation to awkward patriarch proves to give the film the stable base it so desperately needs. Firing out endless asides muttered under his breath while the rest of the cast act for their lives, Long manages to anchor the film by being the connecting tissue between the feral, straight-play threat of the coyotes and the more cartoonish behavior of the side characters which includes one of them trying to shoot themselves while in drug-addled mourning for their consumed cat. Granted, animal lovers may want to steer clear due to the unavoidable body count of coyotes and pets, but while a final reel twist shows why the eponymous canines have gone so bloodthirsty, I’m not sure what the point of it was supposed to be.
Still, with a backdrop of a flammable LA feeling extra topical, Coyotes manages to accomplish the minimum requirements to becoming a fun, trashy and disposable animal amok movie. However, it’s uncertainty considering its own tone means that for most of its runtime it feels like it’s chasing its own tail.
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