The Howling - 1981

 After two months of silence, I forced myself to watch something which would surely get a review posted.  It did.  And don't call me Shirley.

My grandmother used to record movies rented from the store onto VHS at home.  I know a lot of people who did this in the 90s.  VHS were expensive, and with just two VCRS (or one with two tape trays) and some blank tapes you could rip these movies off for relatively cheap, and very easily.  The crime was simple, and a lot of people took advantage, as well as of course recording movies and shows off of cable TV.

Anyways, we borrowed a bunch of VHS from time to time, and one of the ones I remember borrowing specifically had The Howling first and The Manitou second.  Now that I write about it, I wonder how and why this double feature VHS came to be, as well as I wonder specifically how we ended up with it.  Who chose to borrow this?  My dad is the clear candidate, and I wonder if he knew what this or The Manitou was, if he ever watched them, etc.

The Howling was the movie that got Joe Dante onto Gremlins, and cemented him as a horror director before he got later saddled as a kids film director, basically stemming from Gremlins.  Dante had done Piranha before this, and that was successful, but this was also successful and won awards and the effects especially got the movie noticed.  

The Howling stars Dee Wallace, Christopher Stone, Belinda Balasky, and oddly enough Robert Picardo as well as a whole ton of classic character actors like John Carradine and Dick Miller.  We begin with Dee Wallace as Karen being contacted by a serial killer and meeting him in a sleezy porn theater.  Karen works for the news, and is this guy's target basically because he's infatuated with her.  Once at the theater, he turns into a werewolf behind her, gets shot by the police, and leaves her scarred and scared, with a doctor's recommendation to take some time away at "The Colony," a creepy community with a scary secret.

I haven't said it yet, but given that we borrowed this on VHS for a long time, this was a childhood movie of mine that I absolutely loved.  I remembered every part of this, even the exact cadence and tone of some of the dialogue.  I watched this about 1000 times and it was my genesis of horror movie interest.  The script was rewritten by John Sayles, so there's a comedic and meta level to the film, it's a hair over 90 minutes, there's nudity, the vibe is fucking weird and creepy, and everything in this movie works extremely well.

I really love this movie, rewatching it I would say it still holds up.  It's a weird one, for sure, very unique and very tonally offset.  At parts The Howling feels like a 70's movie, but then other parts it feels exactly like a lurid gauzy 80's masturbation fest, so it bridges that line terrifically.  

I feel like I could talk about this movie forever, but overall what I love about it is the atmosphere, the B quality of it, it's full self awareness of what it is, and yet it is solidly backed up with acting and effects.  Nowadays, things lean into genres too much, and movies are seemingly not allowed to just be a little bit funny or off or horrific, they have to commit to things more.  I love that this didn't get roped into being just one thing, and instead it is multiple.

I cannot give this movie less than 5 stars.