A comedy Ginger Snaps sort of is, bad it definitely is not. It's a well-directed and exceedingly well-acted thriller that interprets the werewolf myth as a symbol of puberty and all its associated fears. Ginger Snaps layers its basic conceit--that two teenage sisters feared puberty so much they actually postponed it--with overtunes and undertones variously dramatic and supernatural. The concept of the werewolf has always been a metaphor for both the figurative beast we all have inside us and for the very idea of change, but I've never seen it used so effectively as a symbol for puberty (sorry, Michael J. Fox).

And if the werewolf symbol is a little too blatant for you, consider the undertone I wrote of earlier: one of the reasons Ginger and her sister fear puberty is because they hate what their mother is and don't want to be like her. And what is she--an inmate at an asylum? A murderer? An abusive drug addict? No. She's a wife and mother. Responsible, kind, reasonable. And, as the girls (perhaps correctly) see her, beaten down by the sexist structure of "civilized" western society. They think they'll eventually wind up like their mother--and, though they hate the idea, they're so indoctrinated by the unstated beliefs of their comfortable suburban world that they don't even question them. Great idea, smart movie.