After a close encounter with a mass murderer, a television reporter (Dee Wallace) is sent to "The Colony" to recuperate from her ideal. Once there she discovers that everyone else at the colony is a werewolf.
When The Howling (1981) was new, I watched it every opportunity I could. I loved the movie with it's sense of humor, all of the products that had "wolf" somewhere in their name and all of the nods to classic werewolf movies. I especially loved the wild transformation effects by Rob Bottin. I've only seen it a few times since the 1980s, and overall the movie holds up rather well, though my wife compared the final werewolf shown to a labradoodle.
My only complaint is that for some reason, whoever was responsible for transferring this movie to DVD decided to lighten the exposure on the transformation scenes. Now, what was incredible state of the art make-up effects designed to take advantage of low light levels and shadows looks crude and rubbery in the harsh lighting it was not meant to be seen in. This was an absolutely terrible decision that does nothing but hamper the film's effectiveness. I'm hoping that when The Howling gets released on DVD this will be reverted back to the way it was meant to be seen.
If you've never seen it, you should. Just keep this in mind when you are watching it.
1 comment:
Just wanted to say Happy Halloween! Been fun reading along through the countdown :)
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