In the small town of Beaverfield someone or something is on a killing spree during a snowstorm. Are they dealing with an old fashioned murderer or is it a werewolf?

The Setting

Finn Wheeler is the new ranger in Beaverfield. Once he gets there he is welcomed by Jeanine the inn owner and Cecily the post person who shows him around town. Soon a snowstorm is hitting Beaverfield. And on top of that all the generators are slashed and the road is blocked and the snowplow isn’t working. Most of the Beaverfielders go to the inn for shelter but when Finn finds a dead body under the porch and a dog is taken, they think that someone amongst them is a killer. 

To make matters worse, a plan to build a pipeline is dividing the town. Some people want to sell their land for money while others want to protect the forest. The tension is building and nobody trusts each other anymore. 

But when a zoologist and environmentalist who is staying at the inn, finds a curious hair and DNA of an unidentified canine on the corpse, they start questioning if they are dealing with a killer who wants to stop the pipeline, or the opposite who wants to the build the pipeline, or that they maybe are dealing with a werewolf. 

The Characters

First of all we have Finn Wheeler a very nice guy who doesn’t stand up for himself and has to man up a bit. Beaverfield itself is full of weird people. Jeanine Sherman is the owner of the inn. She is an inviting person, but her husband Dave has left her a month ago for a younger woman. While Dave was for the pipeline Jeanine is against it. 

Cecily Moore is the new post person, who replaced Dave. She is friendly with Finn and can even be a potential love interest. Finn likes her very much and she seems to like him too. 

Devon and Joaquim are the rich gay couple who live in the town for the peace and quiet and beautiful nature. They are against the pipeline. 

Trisha and Pete Anderton are a married couple. Trisha has a little dog called Chai-Chi and she wants to use the money from the buy-out to start her own crafts store. 

Gwen and Marcus are the hillbillies, who are packing guns and they want the money from the pipeline as well. Gwen and Pete slept together a while ago so goes the rumor.. 

At the inn stays Dr. Jane Ellis, a zoologist and environmentalist who has a lot of equipment.

Sam Parker is also from out of town. He is the one who wants to buy out the people to build the pipeline.

And finally up the hill lives the recluse and trapper Emerson Flint who is very hostile towards people.

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Let the killings begin

First of all this is not a straightforward slasher or mystery. Due to what’s going on in the town and between all the people, there’s a lot of resentment, disdain, and all kinds of negative feelings roaming around in the inn. When the storm hits they all show up at the inn, but they can’t find a way to co-exist. But let’s start with the first kill.

• Death no. 1: The movie starts with Dave outside the inn at the edge of the forest. Something is lurking and soon he gets attacked.
• Death no. 2: Just before the storm comes, Trish lets Cha-Chi outside through a cat flap. The leash breaks and Cha-Chi is gone. So they go to the inn to get help. 
• Meanwhile all the generators are slashed and the road is blocked. With no electricity everybody comes into the inn. While they figure out what to do Finn finds a body under the porch. A body that belongs to Dave. When Dr. Ellis examines the hair she finds out that it’s from an unknown canine. A werewolf maybe?
• Their suspicions are confirmed when at night Pete gets attacked and his hand is bitten off. 
• Finn and Cecily went to find Flint for help to trap or kill the werewolf but instead find the collar of Cha-Chi in his cabin. Could he be the werewolf?
• Death no. 3: Dr. Ellis locks herself in her room because she thinks that one of them is a werewolf. So Sam sneaks in through another door and they hear gunshots and Dr. Ellis is killed. Sam says she killed herself. But do we believe him?
  Everybody starts fighting and one by one they leave the inn. Leaving only Finn, Jeanine and Cecily behind. 
• Death no.4: When Joaquim and Devon are walking home from the inn after a big argument between all the townspeople, they are attacked and Devon gets stabbed to death by none other than Trish for preventing her to get her own crafts shop. 
• Death no. 5: Joaquim rushes back to the inn where Cecily and Finn search Sam’s room and find newspaper clippings from attacks all over the country, places where Finn all has been previously. But they also find a knife smelling of diesel. Could Sam be the one who killed the generators? 
• They go outside to find Devon and rush to Trish’s house. There they discover a dead Pete on the couch, who dies from his wound. 
• Death no. 6: But they also find Marcus who has made himself a Freddy Kruger hand and is robbing all the houses. When he flees he gets run over by Gwen. But before she even notices, her head gets shot off by Trish. 
• Death no. 7: Trish ushers Finn, Cecily and Joaquim back inside her house to kill them, but Joaquim bashes her head in with a fire poker. 
• Death no. 8: Outside they find Sam with a crossbow who first shoots Joaquim and then grabs Cecily. Calling out Finn whom he believes is the werewolf, because he found the knife in Finn’s room and brought it back to his own room. He shoots Finn, but it doesn’t kill him. And a dying Joaquim shoots the gas near Sam who gets blown up. 

The Werewolf unmasked

Now only Finn and Cecily and probably Jeanine back at the inn and Flint are left. Cecily takes Finn back to the Axe Den, a sort of pub and also the post office and there Finn discovers Dave’s mailman tag and the package of the fuel injector kit where Gwen was waiting for to repair the snowplow. He realizes that Cecily is the werewolf. 

She reveals herself to him and says her pretending to like him was all an act. They fight and just as Cecily who turned into a werewolf wants to kill him, Flint knocks her out. But of course a werewolf isn’t that easily defeated and as she gets up in the background while Finn and Flint are glad it’s over, Cecily prepares for the jump and gets shot and killed by Jeanine.

While Cecily was the werewolf and turned the residents against each other to make the killings a lot easier, she is not the only killer in town. She held back the package, she hid the knife in Finn’s room so that Sam would find it. She spread rumors and slashed the generators. She might have killed Dave and Cha-Chi and Pete by inflicting a deadly wound but the other killers were just normal humans. 

Trish killed Devon and Gwen, while Gwen accidentally killed her own husband Marcus. Joaquim killed Sam to protect Finn and Cecily and finally Sam probably killed Dr. Ellis from preventing her to reveal more about the werewolf and he killed Joaquim. 

This is a special slasher/ murder spree, by multiple people who didn’t agree and wanted to protect their money, values, hunt or the environment at all costs. Only the actually nice people survived. Even Flint at the end came to the rescue and wanted to be a good neighbor, like Finn has asked him to be. 

So Finn was right all along, being nice and neighborly really is rewarding.