An American Werewolf in London

The greatest Werewolf film ever!
1981 was The Year of the Werewolves...the furry fiends leaped onto movie screens in three major films: "The Howling," "Wolfen," and the classic of the genre, "An American Werewolf in London." There has never been a greater werewolf film, there has never been a better transformation scene, and few horror movies can match the entertaining mixture of humor and scares that writer/direction John Landis ("Animal House," "The Blues Brothers") achieved here.

Although there had been humor in horror films before this movie, "An American Werewolf in London" showed once and for all that having comedy in a horror film didn't mean that the film would lose out in the scare department. Landis makes it clear that the film is NOT a comedy -- the horror scenes are carried with dead-seriousness and shocking impact -- but there is so much quirky humor surrounding these scenes that the film becomes incredibly likable and buoyant. Most of the...

"Beware the Moon" AWIL Blu-review
An American Werewolf in London is probably the best Werewolf flick since Lon Chaney Jr originally transformed under the full moon. Sure, the film is almost 30 years old, but with the new high def transfer it's hard to tell.

As an avid DVD buyer my transition to the Blu-ray media has been a little slow to say the least. I'm generally only buying new titles and am very stubborn when it comes to double dipping on titles I already own. Some companies take the cheap route and just slap an upscaled transfer onto a Blu-ray in order to make some fast cash. This however, is completely worth re buying.

I'll be honest, the first time I saw this film was when it was originally released on DVD back in the late 90's . I instantly fell in love with the movie. Everything about it was perfect, the humor, the scares, the sfx, the amazing soundtrack. It's very rare to find a movie that so perfectly combines horror and comedy, a film with characters you truly care for. This...

ONE OF THE SCARIEST MOVIES EVER MADE!!!
This is one of the few movies that have consistently given me nightmares since I was a child. It is at least a decade ahead of its time. Most of the negative criticisms that I have read use the word "uneven" a lot. Even Roger Ebert, whom I admire, claimed that the humor and the horror were an uneasy mix. This was years before he gave the movie Scream a positive review. Now I LIKE the movie Scream, but there is no way that one can claim that it gets the balance right whereas Werewolf gets it wrong. Scream simply benefits from occurring in the cynical nineties - Werewolf suffers from being avant guard. .

The new DVD has a few good extras on it - especially a new interview with Landis. Even after all these years, the film still holds up. Unlike most films, I see more things in it the more I look. What, for instance, is up with the townsfolk of East Proctor and what is their relationship with the original werewolf? My guess - they brought it on themselves somehow. Maybe one...

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