How did the wolf characteristics get passed onto Laura?

Question

It is implied at the end of Wolf that Laura Alden herself transforms into a wolf in the same way that Will Randall does.

At the beginning of the movie, Will is bitten by a wolf after he hits it with his car. Will then proceeds to bite his one-time protege, Stuart Swinton, on the hand. These two were the only characters shown throughout the movie to have been bitten and start transforming into a wolf-like creature.

Near the end of the film, Laura exhibits heightened senses such as Will and Stuart did throughout the movie. She makes a comment to one of the police officers that she can smell vodka on his breath.

Laura: Can I send you something to drink, detective? Another vodka tonic?

Detective Bridger: ...No thanks.

Laura: Let me know if you change your mind.

Detective Bridger: How the hell would she know what we've been drinking?

Laura: I can smell it. I can smell it a mile away.

The final scene shows a close up of Laura's eyes insinuating that she is herself turning into a wolf.

When was Laura ever bitten during the movie? She and Will did have sex one evening, and Stuart did attempt to rape her later in the film. Did one of these encounters pass on the characteristics of the wolf to her?

Answer 1

Three possibilities, none of which have been confirmed by production. Intentionally vague ending to make the audience think.

1. Lycanthropy is presented as an infectious diseases passed through bodily fluids. Will and Stuart got it through saliva to blood contact. There is no reason to assume it can pass through saliva to saliva or blood to blood or sexual fluid contacts. At no point did they imply she was bitten or scratched though, so the sexual contact is the only logical reason.

2. As the expert on werewolves says earlier, some people have a wolf analog inside, and their passion can bring it out. Laura's connection to Will and the events could have caused her to manifest the demon wolf inside her. A mystical reason.

   Your people are wrong. Sometimes, one doesn't even need to be bitten. Only the passion of the wolf is enough.

3. My personal interpretation of the events: Laura was compelled by the events, her feelings towards Will, seeing what Will was to be, to cause herself to be infected. She infected herself with Stuarts or Wills blood after Will left. She willingly tried to become the wolf. Much like Will slowly came to accept the wolf and went off to become the wolf, it's a symbolic and thematic ending. Having Laura do the same explains the final scene showing Will's full transformation imposed over her starting her transformation.

Answer 2

#1 Perhaps Michelle Pfeiffer's character was actually the werewolf in the very beginning of the movie that bit Jack Nicholson.

#2 my second theory is as previously mentioned in another comment she may have been infected by Nicholson doing a sexual encounter. There is one specific scene when they both wake up together the morning that the cops came to inform them of his wife's passing. In that scene there was a seemingly unnecessary emphasis on the open mouth tongue kiss that they exchanged when Michelle Pfeiffer woke up. That in itself could be the transmission if not from the implied sex that they had, because there didn't seem to really be a extra need to emphasize that open mouth kiss the way they highlighted it in the scene.

#3 I don't think Jack Nicholson killed his wife I think it may have been Stewart, the second werewolf. Even though Jack Nicholson had muddy boots in the car with Michelle Pfeiffer the next day.