The Howling

Released - 1981
Genre - Horror, Fantasy, Mystery
Director - Joe Dante
Starring - Dee Wallace, Patrick Macnee, Dennis Dugan, Christopher Stone, Belinda Balaski, Dick Miller

News anchorwoman Karen takes part in a sting on a serial killer which goes wrong and deeply traumatised she takes the advice of her psychiatrist and accepts a free break at a retreat known as The Colony. The retreat doesn't turn out to be relaxing at all as she is drawn into the world of the werewolf. There are some great ideas at play here and lots of werewolf references but while I remember this movie fondly it hasn't aged particularly well. Central character Karen is a typical weak heroine making all the wrong moves and she is played badly by Dee Wallace. Things take a while to get going when they do there is plenty of werewolf action but the effects are dated. There's some sex and comedy thrown into the mix but not much in the way of gore or scares and while this is fun it's also undeniably silly.

Monster - lots of werewolves but as usual they don't look too great, the transformation effects which were great at the time now look very dated

© 2008-2015 Eat Horror