It's always tricky trying to write a review of a great movie that you've loved for years. Attempting to finally put down in words exactly what makes it so great seems almost impossible ... but I'll give it a shot anyway. Ladies and Gentlemen, I give to you, An American Werewolf in London -- Two American's arrive by truck in the Yorkshire moors, as part of a three-month tour of Europe. As they walk along the country roads, they engage in realistic back-and-forth banter and we learn that Jack is unhappy with the situation and would much rather be in some continental city, whereas his friend David is glad to explore the English countryside. As the sun goes down, they take refuge inside a pub called "the Slaughtered Lamb", to escape the cold. The locals are unfriendly, especially when they ask about a pentagram painted on the wall ... the two of them eventually take the hint, and leave to continue walking through the moors.
Wandering off the road into the dark grassy land, they begin to hear strange and frightening howling noises, and see something big stalking them in the shadows ... suddenly Jack is attacked, and David flees the scene before turning back to help his friend, but he too is set upon by some kind of wolf-beast until the locals show up armed with shotguns. He wakes up in a hospital, and learns that his friend Jack is dead. While there, he falls in love with a beautiful young nurse. As he recovers from his trauma, he has peculiar dreams about monsters, misty woods, and killing. Then he starts having gruesome visions of his dead friend, who warns him that he is becoming a werewolf ...
There are so many memorable sequences in this movie it's unbelievable. My favourite has always been the initial werewolf attack on the moors -- I first saw the movie when I was very young and that was the one that scared me most of all. I also remembered the dream sequences particularly well, and that poor man who is stalked by the werewolf in the London underground. It's an incredibly surreal movie, especially during the excellent hospital sequences, because, well, becoming a werewolf would be a pretty surreal thing to go through! All of this is helped by the high quality of directing from John Landis, and Rick Baker's infamously brilliant make-up inventions.
The soundtrack is also excellent -- Landis' idea was that he would only use songs with the word 'moon' in the title. Since then the songs "Bad Moon Rising" and "Blue Moon" are automatically linked with this movie by anyone who's seen it. The cast is also very notable, and both David Naughton and Griffin Dunne give funny, competent performances as the two Americans, while the all-star British cast is headed by the brilliant Brian Glover, Jenny Agutter and John Woodvine.
Some of the comedy may be a little cheesy, but most of it is still worth a few laughs. You should bear in mind that this was the first real horror comedy ever made, and these days they're a dime-a-dozen. If it hadn't been for American Werewolf, the genre would certainly not have been the same. This is an indisputable classic of the horror genre, and an incredible important movie. Two decades on, it's easily still deserving of it's title as the greatest Werewolf movie of all time.
Wandering off the road into the dark grassy land, they begin to hear strange and frightening howling noises, and see something big stalking them in the shadows ... suddenly Jack is attacked, and David flees the scene before turning back to help his friend, but he too is set upon by some kind of wolf-beast until the locals show up armed with shotguns. He wakes up in a hospital, and learns that his friend Jack is dead. While there, he falls in love with a beautiful young nurse. As he recovers from his trauma, he has peculiar dreams about monsters, misty woods, and killing. Then he starts having gruesome visions of his dead friend, who warns him that he is becoming a werewolf ...
There are so many memorable sequences in this movie it's unbelievable. My favourite has always been the initial werewolf attack on the moors -- I first saw the movie when I was very young and that was the one that scared me most of all. I also remembered the dream sequences particularly well, and that poor man who is stalked by the werewolf in the London underground. It's an incredibly surreal movie, especially during the excellent hospital sequences, because, well, becoming a werewolf would be a pretty surreal thing to go through! All of this is helped by the high quality of directing from John Landis, and Rick Baker's infamously brilliant make-up inventions.
The soundtrack is also excellent -- Landis' idea was that he would only use songs with the word 'moon' in the title. Since then the songs "Bad Moon Rising" and "Blue Moon" are automatically linked with this movie by anyone who's seen it. The cast is also very notable, and both David Naughton and Griffin Dunne give funny, competent performances as the two Americans, while the all-star British cast is headed by the brilliant Brian Glover, Jenny Agutter and John Woodvine.
Some of the comedy may be a little cheesy, but most of it is still worth a few laughs. You should bear in mind that this was the first real horror comedy ever made, and these days they're a dime-a-dozen. If it hadn't been for American Werewolf, the genre would certainly not have been the same. This is an indisputable classic of the horror genre, and an incredible important movie. Two decades on, it's easily still deserving of it's title as the greatest Werewolf movie of all time.