An American Werewolf in London (1981): Directed by John Landis

For the five Mondays we have this fine month of October, we'll be focusing exclusively on horror movies to coincide with Halloween, as per request by some A&E regulars. The horror genre is overlooked amongst many circles of film fans, so hopefully this helps showcase, at least a little, all the cool things about the genre that we may take for granted or never even notice.

We're going to start off with An American Werewolf in London, a wickedly underrated werewolf movie that has found a broader audience on DVD than it had on video or in its theatrical run. American friends David Kessler (David Naughton) and Jack Goodman (Griffin Dunn) are two young American men backpacking through England before making their way to Italy. One night they stray from the main road in East Proctor, a small community outside of London, and end up lost on the moors underneath a full moon. While trying to find the main road, the boys are attacked by a werewolf, which rips Jack apart and bites David before the pub regulars of The Slaughtered Lamb (a very apt name) shoot the beast. David ends up in a London hospital in which he lies comatose for three weeks.

But the problem is this: having been bitten by a werewolf, David himself will turn into one the next full moon, as told to him by Jack's undead corpse (which appears as it did upon death, mangled and disgusting). At first David thinks he's losing his mind, which causes concern to Nurse Alex Price (an adorably cute Jenny Agutter). But when the first full moon occurs, David finds out that Jack was right, and realizes that the only way for Jack to find peace in death and David in life is for David to commit suicide. He doesn't, and people of London begin dying oh-so-mysterious deaths under each new full moon.

The plot sounds pretty basic for a werewolf movie, but I assure you that it's anything but. Besides delivering some real bona fide scares, Werewold is also a very funny black comedy, and director Landis mixes the two to perfection. David and Jack have a real friendly chemistry -- while Jack is both alive and undead, matched by the chemistry between David and Nurse Alex. This is just a short (hour and a half), fun, creepy, funny little movie that never takes itself so seriously, and is arguably the best werewolf movie to ever be spawned from the sub-genre.

But we can't really bring this movie up without discussing the transformation scene in which David initially turns into a werewolf. First, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences never gave out an award for make-up before this movie's release; the legendary Rick Baker's make-up effects were so groundbreaking that the Academy actually added the award to its yearly competition because of it. And for 1981, this is amazing stuff (not to say that it still doesn't hold up today, because it does). Even in the digital age we live in, where characters and complete sets can be created on a computer and shipped directly to the big screen, this transformation is still the best ever IMO. Through great make-up, great direction, and very difficult, convincing acting, you see a man turn into a monster right before your eyes on the celluloid. If you've never seen the movie, and still don't know if it's worth it, I'm including the transformation scene below. If that doesn't change your mind, nothing will. The movie is worth the rental fee for that scene alone.

Writer/director Landis (yes, the same one of Animal House fame) really hit the nail on the head with this one. He wrote the script in 1969, but for over ten years the script didn't sell because most thought it was too scary to be funny or too funny to be scary. Hogwash. Credit Landis the director as being able to wear both hats extremely well to create a quite unique little movie for it's time. I can't think of a single person who ever claimed to dislike this movie, even those who don't quite fancy horror movies. But Werewolf transcends the genre, which is most likely the main contributor to both its overall likability and even its greatness. Good characters, fun effects, and a very apt soundtrack (all the song titles have the word "moon" in them) all add up to a fun little ride. The perfect movie to ease this Movie of the Week series off in the right direction.



Previous Movies of the Week:
#1: Gladiator
#2: The Passion of the Christ
#3: Cool Hand Luke
#4: Fight Club
#5: American Beauty
#6: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
#7: Goodfellas
#8: Boogie Nights
#9: American Psycho
#10: Dr. Strangelove
#11: Dog Day Afternoon
#12: Unforgiven
#13: 2001: A Space Odyssey
#14: Do the Right Thing
#15: Reservoir Dogs
#16: Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
#17: L.A. Confidential
#18: Big Trouble in Little China
#19: Out of Sight
#20: The Shawshank Redemption
#21: The Waterboy
#22: Field of Dreams
#23: The Godfather
#24: The Godfather Part II
#25: The Godfather Part III
#26: Network
#27: Die Hard
#28: Sin City
#29: Dawn of the Dead
#30: American History X
#31: Swingers
#32: Thelma & Louise
#33: Casablanca
#34: Independence Day
#35: Jaws
#36: Adaptation
#37: The Life Aquatic
#38: Rushmore
#39: The Royal Tenenbaums
#40: The Insider
#41: In the Line of Fire

Feel free to sticky and poll this at any time, mods.

I saw this when I was too young to see it. As a result, David's first transformation sent me running out of my grandmother's house wailing up the street.

Bravo frank, you did an excellent job on the write up. It sets the bar pretty high if you ask me.

This is definitely an overlooked classic, at least as you said, among non-genre fans. The effects were phenomenal, and really everything about this movie is awesome. It gets moving pretty quickly, but still takes the time to make you care for the characters and the plight our main man will soon be going through.

I love the joke the guys are telling the Slaughtered Lamb too.

"It was still too evvy"

That's always the best time to see horror movies.

i saw this when i was really young too and don't remember much, if anything.
*moves to top of netflix queue*

hah- This is about the same experience I had when this movie came out- I was 15 and went to see it with my sister and her boyfriend. Around the point when he changed into the Werewolf my sister's boyfriend turned to both of us and said: ok, I don't know if Mary is old enough to be seeing this- do you two want to leave?

We stayed, but I had a very difficult time getting to sleep that night.

Good movie but it was scary then because I don't think this kind of SFX were being used at that point in time- If I saw it again now I think it would be rather tame compared to a lot of scary movies out these days.

Get on that shit. You're going to love it.

It's funny to read how others saw this at a young age, when this is the first movie I remember ever watching (not saying the first movie I saw, but the first I remember). I couldn't have been older than 5 or 6. It scared the shit out of me. But it will also always hold a special place in my heart.

Well I have a similar story to tell later in the month my friend.