France 1764: In the region of Gévaudan, a wolf-like beastis on a killing spree, so the king sends biologist Fronsac (Samuel Le Bihan) and his sidekick Mani (Mark Dacascos), a martial arts-wise American Indian (?!) to investigate. Several attempts to track down the wolf (or whatever it is) lead to naught, but at least Fronsac finds love in noblewoman Marianne de Morangias (Émilie Dequenne) and sexual satisfaction in prostitute Sylvia (Monica Belucci). Then a new man, Beauterne (Johan Leysen), is appointed to hunt down the beast, and before long, he has shot down an ordinary wolf and tells Fronsac to surgically turn it into a ferocious beast simply because the existence of the beast threatens the king ... reluctantly, Fronsac agrees.

Even though his next appointment is in Africa, Fronsac returns to Gévaudan to finish his business with the beast ... and this time around, it doesn't take him and Mani long at all to find the beast and even injure it in a fight, but when Mani follows the beast to its hideout, he has a run-in with the masters of the beast - the beast is really an ordinary wolf cloaked in armour and used to terrorize the country and dethrone the king -, a run-in he doesn't survive.

When he examines his friend's body, Fronsac realizes he has been killed by humans, and it doesn't take him long to identify Sardis (Jean-Francois Stévenin), a local clergyman, as one of the masters of the beast, but this knowledge lands him in jail.

Prostitute Sylvia, who now turns out to be a secret agent in the Vatican's employ, visits Fronsac in jail ... and poisons him.

It seems that the secret society led by Sardis, which includes many of the region's aristocrats all hell-bent on rebuilding France, has won. One member of this society is Jean-Francois (Vincent Cassel), Marianne's own brother, who has pretended for the longest time that he has only one arm (though it eludes me why) and who now rapes and almost kills his sister.

The finale sees the society congregating, when suddenly Fronsac - who hasn't really been poisoned by Sylvia but put into suspended animation to get him out of jail - intervenes, gives the whole society a good thrashing, then the soldiers interfere and arrest everyone.

And Marianna and Fronsac after all have a happy ending with each other ...

It's hard to pass final judgement on this film: On one hand it's really well-made, the camerawork is more than elegant, the action is beautifully staged and the special effects, though not always totally convincing, are beautifully inserted into the on-screen goings-on. On the other hand the film features a very silly story but takes itself way too seriously. The inclusion of a plethora of historical facts (there even was a real beast but its secret remains a mystery) and some esoteric elements (hey, there's an Indian in it, so there's got to be some esoteric mumbo-jumbo) don't help the movie along one bit either and if anything make it even sillier. Also, with 140 minutes, the film is way too long for its feeble story and its own good, and most of its subplots it could have done without as well. And why is everybody in 18th century France an expert in martial arts ? Add to all of this a lead actor who lacks the charisma to carry the film and you just about get the picture.

Yet the film isn't all bad either, at times it's actually pretty entertaining, it just certainly is no masterpiece.

In 2003, a very different and decidedly more down-to-earth version of the same legend was filmed, aptly titled La Bête du Gévaudan.

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In times of uncertainty of a possible zombie outbreak, a woman has to decide between two men - only one of them's one of the undead.

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special appearances by
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directed by
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written by
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produced by
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