Ginger Snaps Back: The Beginning (2004) Revisited – Horror Movie Review

INTRO: 1815. Canadian settlers are pushing westward. A trading company has set up a fort in the middle of a vast wilderness… and now that fort is under siege. Ravenous beasts lurk in the forest, howling, scratching at the gate. These pioneers have entered werewolf territory. That’s the set-up for the most unexpected prequel of all time, Ginger Snaps Back: The Beginning (watch it HERE). And it’s the Best Horror Movie You Never Saw.

CREATORS / CAST: Director John Fawcett’s teenage werewolf movie Ginger Snaps started making its way out into the world in the year 2000. It quickly earned a cult following, and a reputation for being one of the best werewolf movies ever made. It had a low budget and was so financially successful, two follow-ups were given the greenlight. These would be shot back-to-back, with Ginger Snaps editor Brett Sullivan taking the helm of one and Ginger Snaps’ second unit director Grant Harvey being chosen to direct the other. Every film in the trilogy had a male director and a female screenwriter. Fawcett directed the first movie from a script by Karen Walton. For Ginger Snaps 2: Unleashed, Brett Sullivan teamed with writer Megan Martin – and while the first movie had a quirky sense of humor, Sullivan and Martin largely set that aside. Their sequel was darker and more nihilistic than its predecessor, leading to a downer ending that was begging for a sequel to come along and resolve some issues. But that’s not what Grant Harvey’s contribution to the franchise would be. Working with writers Christina Ray and Stephen Massicotte, Harvey crafted a bizarre prequel, taking the setting from the early 2000s back to the early 1800s.

Ginger Snaps had starred Katharine Isabelle and Emily Perkins as teenage sisters Ginger and Brigitte Fitzgerald. On the same day her first period begins, Ginger is attacked by a werewolf. And while that creature ends up roadkill, Ginger has been infected by its bite. She gradually becomes a werewolf. This girl’s adolescence involves a monstrous transformation. Brigitte desperately tries to find a cure for her sister’s ailment before it’s too late… But in the end, she has to decide whether to kill her sister or join her. The story of Ginger and Brigitte is a heartbreaking one, and Isabelle and Perkins reprised their roles in the downbeat sequel.

Grant Harvey’s Ginger Snaps Back: The Beginning brings Isabelle and Perkins back again, but they’re not quite the same characters we knew before. They’re still playing young sisters named Ginger and Brigitte Fitzgerald – but now they’re making their way through the Canadian wilderness in the year 1815. They’ll say they were accompanying their parents on a boating trip, trying to find a way to pass through the western mountains, then their boat overturned, their parents drowned, and the girls are on their own. This seems to be a lie. Their parents may be dead, but they didn’t drown. It’s likely the girls killed them in some way, for some reason. But the method and the motive don’t mean much. We just need to know the sisters have been through something extreme and they have pledged to stick by each other’s side. Together forever. This pledge will be put to the test when they reach a place called Fort Bailey, which presumably stands in the same area where the suburb Bailey Downs, the setting of the first movie, will be built.

This fort was set up by men from the Northern Legion Trading Company. The indigenous people warned them this was a bad place to build a fort in, but they didn’t listen. The natives believe in the ancient legend of the Wendigo, a curse passed down through the blood of generations. There’s talk of a day of reckoning and the arrival of two sisters, referred to as the Red and the Black, in a time when death will consume the land and good will face evil. The outcome of that confrontation will decide whether the curse will be broken or grow stronger to plague further generations. Well, Ginger and Brigitte are the Red and the Black, and when they get to Fort Bailey, death is already consuming the land. There are only a handful of men left in the fort, and most of them seem to be at the edge of insanity. A group that left in the spring was supposed to return with supplies that would help them survive the harsh winter. That group is two months overdue. It’s winter. Supplies are running low. And, worst of all, werewolves stalk the forest surrounding the fort, and they’ll take any opportunity to try to get through the gate.

Seeking shelter in Fort Bailey, Ginger and Brigitte interact with characters played by Nathaniel Arcand, JR Bourne, Hugh Dillon, Adrien Dorval, David La Haye, Tom McCamus, Matthew Walker, Fabian Bird, Kirk Jarrett, David MacInnis, Stevie Mitchell, Edna Rain, and Brendan Fletcher, who played a different role in Ginger Snaps 2. A lot of these characters, we don’t get to know much about. Some of them are likeable. Most of them are not. And several of them will be dead by the time the credits roll.

BACKGROUND: Harvey told Fangoria magazine that he decided to make an oddball prequel because he was intimidated by the idea of making a follow-up to Ginger Snaps. He said, “I’m a huge fan of the first film; it’s a great movie. When they asked me to do a sequel, I was like, ‘Oh God, I don’t know if I want to screw that up.’ To deal with that, I kind of said, ‘We should take the idea of a sequel and just flip it on its head.’ So that’s what we’ve done. … We took the same two main characters, and the same two actresses playing those characters. Put them in a similar situation, in that Ginger gets bitten by a werewolf and is starting to turn. But we placed it in the early 1800s. So we’re just totally messing with the idea of a sequel. … We’ve put our two girls, Brigitte and Ginger, in Canada’s past, and we haven’t explained it. They’re just there.”

Ginger Snaps Back was a low budget production with a month-long shooting schedule. Crew members were tired because they came to the set directly after finishing Ginger Snaps 2. As a period piece that features a lot of characters, the script was a challenge to bring to the screen. It was made more complicated when revisions took longer than expected, so Harvey didn’t have as much prep time as he would have liked. Instead of planning his shooting days ahead of time, he had to map out each day during the morning. But the director had a blast making the movie anyway. He said, “It’s so much fun. Every day I show up and we’re doing something cool. There isn’t a day that doesn’t have some sort of cool set, or some cool scene between amazing actors. Or werewolves. Every day is just awesome.”

The film benefited from the fact that the fort location was a real place. The filmmakers didn’t have to build it. It was Fort Edmonton, a detailed replica of a fur trading post. So it was exactly what the movie needed – with the bonus that it was built in the 1970s, so it was heated and had plumbing. The cast and crew didn’t have to rough it as much as the characters did. Harvey wanted the movie to look the way a Brothers Grimm fairy tale feels. Working with cinematographer Michael Marshall, he was able to achieve that. The movie has a dark, unsettling atmosphere that does make it seem like a fractured fairy tale, and the fort setting goes right along with that feeling.

Lionsgate had co-financed and been a distributor on the first Ginger Snaps, and they were behind the two follow-ups as well. They released Ginger Snaps 2 in January of 2004 – and Ginger Snaps Back followed later that year, reaching home video in September. The movies were well received, although both fell short of the positivity and excitement the first film had stirred up. Ginger Snaps 2 didn’t score as highly as Ginger Snaps did… and Ginger Snaps Back didn’t go over as well as part 2 did. Which is understandable. The idea of making a prequel but still having Ginger and Brigitte as the lead characters, living in the 1800s, it was confusing. Jarring. A lot of fans were probably asking “What the hell is this?” within minutes of putting the movie on.

WHAT MAKES IT GREAT: Harvey and the writers attempted to make the idea make sense, working in the idea of a curse that is passed down through generations, presenting the idea that the Ginger and Brigitte Fitzgerald of the early 2000s were always destined to have a werewolf experience. The Ginger and Brigitte of the 1800s are presumably blood relatives of theirs. The Fitzgerald family had to go through this multiple times until it reached the right conclusion. So if you want an explanation, you can keep thoughts of cursed bloodlines and reincarnation in mind while watching the movies. For others, the best way to approach Ginger Snaps Back would be to not think about that stuff at all. Just take it as a standalone werewolf story that’s set in the 1800s, and the fact that it’s part of the Ginger Snaps franchise just gives us the opportunity to see Katharine Isabelle and Emily Perkins in the lead roles. Never mind that they’ve played characters just like these ones before.

Taking it on its own merits, pushing franchise implications aside, Ginger Snaps Back is a well-told werewolf story. There are elements that are reminiscent of John Carpenter’s The Thing: you have a group of characters trapped in an isolated location during the winter, and not only are there monsters at the gate, there are also some inside the fort. The young son of one of the fur traders was bitten… and his dad is keeping him around. This little wolf boy is still running around inside the fort. He’s not the only werewolf who has infiltrated the fort. Ginger is bitten early on and gradually transforms.

Isabelle and Perkins turned in great performances in all of these movies, and they have a strong supporting cast to work with in this movie. Most of the men in the fort are deeply unpleasant. Viewers will probably be rooting for the werewolves to come in and eat these guys. But even if the characters are awful people, the performances are solid. One standout, a rare likeable character, is the Hunter, played by Nathaniel Arcand. A member of the Cree tribe, he has been hearing of the werewolf legend his entire life. Now that his homeland is infested with werewolves, he proves to be a skilled werewolf killer. Unfortunately, the resolution of the werewolf situation doesn’t rest on his shoulders. It’s all up to Ginger and Brigitte.

The first Ginger Snaps had unique werewolf designs; the monsters moved on all fours and were less hairy than you might expect. Creature designer Paul Jones chose to show skin and muscle instead of covering the werewolves in fur. For the follow-ups, the filmmakers had the money to bring in the legendary KNB EFX Group. They took the original design and built on it, making the werewolves hairier in the process. You don’t get to see a great deal of the werewolves in Ginger Snaps Back, but when they are on the screen, they look awesome. The movie also adds to werewolf lore with the idea that leeches are the best way to check for werewolf infection. If a leech is placed on someone who has been bitten by a werewolf, both the person and the leech will have intense reactions.

BEST SCENE(S): The scene where Finn, the character played by Brendan Fletcher, undergoes a leech test is one of the best in the movie, and one where the film is most reminiscent of The Thing. It’s a low-key variation on that movie’s blood test scene. Finn is suffering from a werewolf bite and has decided to chop up the leeches so they can’t reveal his secret. But the fort doctor catches him in the act, when there are still leeches left. Gun in hand, the doctor makes Finn place a leech on his chest. And we see that leeches and lycanthropy do not mix.

Of course, the biggest werewolf action is reserved for the end of the movie. And when it comes, with the werewolves getting inside the fort, it’s very cool. Especially when we get to watch the Hunter take down werewolves with bullets, blades, and arrows. Luckily, killing these werewolves doesn’t require silver.

PARTING SHOT: Making an 1800s-set prequel to Ginger Snaps, one that still involves Ginger and Brigitte, was an odd choice. But it worked, because Ginger Snaps Back turned out to be a great werewolf movie. There aren’t enough of those out there – so if you’re a werewolf fan who hasn’t seen this one yet, seek it out and give it a try. The connection to the original Ginger Snaps is weird, but the movie is dark and creepy, with strong acting performances and some cool werewolves. So take a trip to Fort Bailey, spend some more time with the Fitzgerald sisters, and watch some people get ripped apart.

A couple previous episodes of the Best Horror Movie You Never Saw series can be seen below. To see more, and to check out some of our other shows, head over to the JoBlo Horror Originals YouTube channel – and subscribe while you’re there!