Friday, September 18, 2015

100 Scariest Movie Moments: #81 The Howling

The Howling is commonly known among horror movie fans as “the werewolf movie that came out in 1981 that wasn’t An American Werewolf in London.” Not for one moment will I pretend that Howling doesn't deserve its place in American Werewolf’s shadow. American Werewolf has better acting, directing, special effects, and a more compelling storyline than Howling by far.

However, does this mean that Howling is bad? Hell no. Neither was How Green Was My Valley, a film that just had the shit luck of beating both The Maltese Falcon and Citizen Kane for Best Picture, thus assuring it a century of hatred (still going strong) from anyone who gives a damn about film history (...at least I assume it was good, I've never actually seen How Green Was My Valley...). In the same way, The Howling was not made to do battle with a titan of the genre.

Dealing with the plot, the storyline is a bit convoluted. A reporter (Dee Wallace) is traumatized after a terrifying encounter with a serial killer (Robert Picardo) ends with the killer being shot by police. She is told by her therapist (Patrick Macnee) that she needs to go on vacation to a secluded resort to recover. As it turns out though, the serial killer, the therapist, and the entire town are all werewolves. Needless to say, the serial killer isn't dead. And by the end of the film, she and her husband (Christopher Stone) have both been turned as well. The ending shows her turning into a werewolf on live television to prove their existence, and being shot with a silver bullet in a mercy killing by a friend. Just to twist the screws a bit harder, it implies that no one will believe that what they just saw was real.

I'm not entirely clear on how much free will werewolves have in this world. Their werewolf forms seem to be evil, but they also seem to act with intent that's carried over from their human forms. Her husband becomes evil, but he was already an unlikable bastard who cheated on her. This whole thing makes me seriously question if shooting her while in werewolf form was really necessary at all, or if it was just a precautionary measure for an unfounded fear.

The thing best remembered about this film is probably the sex scene, which to me is a great disservice to an otherwise decent movie. If we're going to remember something about this film it should be Robert Picardo, who gives one of the great performances of horror cinema. Sadly, he seems to have mostly been forgotten. The special effects are also quite good. And while they can't hold a candle to American Werewolf, they could contend quite nicely with Underworld, which came out two decades later.

Ultimately, this film is merely “good.” I'm happy to share a planet with this film and all of the people involved in its creation. If I happened to run into the director or a member of the cast while grocery shopping, and for some bizarre reason I had my copy of the DVD, I would probably ask them to autograph the case. But, I probably wouldn't seek them out at a Con or read their biographies.

The fact that this movie is so forgettable is probably why the sequels all seem to be more readily available. The sequels are mostly known for being delightful trash, which does make them more memorable. However, that doesn't exactly make me happy, since I do think this film is deserving of praise. I know I sound contradictory on that point, but I feel like I have to struggle to not insult this movie, since American Werewolf is a thing. This is a film that would probably be legendary in a universe without American Werewolf... but, that's not really a universe in which I'd want to live.

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