The Rats Are Coming! The Werewolves Are Here! 1972

In 1899, the Mooney family inhabits a sprawling house deep in rural England, living under a quiet and uneasy shadow. Pa Mooney Douglas Phair, the infirm patriarch and a retired medical doctor, claims to be an astonishing 180 years old, a claim that his family both clings to and questions as his health wavers. His eldest daughter, Phoebe Mooney Joan Ogden, largely shoulders the burden of his care and the daily running of the household, managing the fragile routine with a steady, if weary, resolve. The family’s finances and business sense are handled by Mortimer Mooney Berwick Kaler, whose practical mind keeps their income and operations in order, even as the secret they guard gnaws at them from within.

Lurking beneath the surface is a far darker dynamic. The younger daughter, Monica Mooney Hope Stansbury, harbors a dangerous temperament; she keeps live rats as pets and enacts cruelty on small creatures, a chilling sign of the malevolent undercurrents flowing through the house. The youngest son, Malcolm Mooney Andy Milligan, is described as a half-wit with animalistic tendencies, and the family confines him in a room with live chickens, a stark image of the containment that governs their lives. The most intimate terror, however, is not their behavior but their shared truth: they are all natural-born werewolves who transform on the monthly night of the full moon, a curse that Pa has spent years researching in the hope of breaking.

Into this tightly wound world returns Diana Jackie Skarvellis from medical school in Scotland, accompanied by a new husband, Gerald Ian Innes, a former classmate whom Pa disapproves of. Diana’s arrival redefines the family’s fragile balance. Pa insists that Diana is the last, best hope to end the centuries-old curse since she is uniquely the one member who does not become a werewolf on the full-moon night. Yet beneath the surface of this hopeful claim lies doubt: Diana arrives with her own hidden motives, and a personal secret that explains why she feels different from the rest of the Mooney clan.

As night falls and the moon rises, tensions simmer and loyalties fray. The house becomes a crucible where old resentments, protective loves, and the chilling truth of their condition collide. Diana’s presence casts doubt on whether the curse can truly be broken or simply transformed by new strategies and fresh ambitions. The narrative threads a careful path between healing and harm, science and superstition, longing and control, all while the family confronts the cyclical violence that defines their lives.

The story unfolds with a careful, patient tempo, inviting viewers to observe how each family member negotiates their role within the curse. Phoebe’s quiet resilience, Mortimer’s pragmatic steadiness, Monica’s unpredictable menace, Malcolm’s vulnerable fragility, and Pa’s steadfast hope all interact with Diana’s secretive agenda, painting a portrait of a family that is as capable of tenderness as it is of terror. And at the heart of it all lies the question that drives the drama: can a person born into a werewolf bloodline find a way to finally break the cycle, or will the truth about Diana—and the power she wields—rewrite the Mooneys’ fate once and for all?