The Howling on DVD

Joe Dante’s movies are always a bit of a howl, and none more - at least figuratively - than this innovative and entertaining werewolf movie.

And now MGM has given the movie a terrific DVD treatment, with widescreen and Pan&Scan versions in the same box and enough special features to choke a, well, wolf.

Dee Wallace stars as Karen White, a TV reporter who at the film’s beginning helps police capture (they think) a vicious serial killer. But the bust is so traumatic for her that she and her husband travel to rural California to visit a place called “The Colony” to get her head back together.

Well, wouldn’t you know that’s the worst place she could have gone!

The Colony, assumed to be a rather harmless place run by a seemingly benevolent doctor (Patrick MacNee), is actually home to a pack of werewolves, of whom “Eddie” (the guy she'd just helped bust) is one - and still alive, or at least undead, despite having been gunned down near the movie’s beginning.

There, she and, especially, her husband (Christopher Stone) are drawn into the werewolves’ web, as it were.

This is, of course, a really superficial look at a highly entertaining horror flick that’s full of typical Dante touches and cameos.

Dante cut his teeth, so to speak, working with the legendary Roger Corman (who has a walk on in “Howling”). He first gained notoriety by helming Piranha, a pretty neat monster movie in its own right. He pulled fellow Piranha alumnus John Sayles (who has since carved out his own directorial niche) to help write The Howling, and fledgling makeup wizard Rob Bottin was hired to create the wild onscreen transformations from human to wolf. The transformations are on a par with Rick Baker’s in John Landis’ “American Werewolf in London,” and helped transform the world of special effect makeup.

Bottin, by the way, would go on to other Dante flicks as well as such horror classics as John Carpenter’s “The Thing.”

Anyway, The Howling is full of memorable characters who come very close to stealing the movie from the stars. Besides MacNee there’s sexy werewolf Elisabeth Brooks, old curmudgeon John Carradine, lawman Slim Pickens, and Dante regulars Kevin McCarthy and Dick Miller. And watch for Forrest J. Ackerman, arguably science fiction’s number one fan, in a walk-on.

The script is witty, and all the werewolf movie clichés you’d expect are there - but handled in a way whereby the movie is poking fun at itself tongue firmly in cheek. It’s never particularly scary, but despite that it has all the look and feel of a genre classic.

There’s a great scene near the beginning that has little to do with the movie, but which pokes much deserved fun at TV news people. The male anchor (Jim McKrell) is rehearsing his delivery in front of a mirror, in full “TV Newsman” voice, when Karen’s husband comes in. We laughed and laughed, and replayed the scene a couple of times.

So The Howling successfully balances horror, humor, sex, and gore, all with a nod and a wink to the classics that have come before. The budget is low, but everything’s on the screen and the movie actually looks better than it deserves to all things considered.

The DVD looks great, with rich color composition. There’s some grain, but overall, the picture is plenty sharp. MGM has chosen to offer both anamorphic widescreen and Pan&Scan versions of the film on the same disc, which is the way to do it if you have to make P&S available.

Audio is available in an enhanced 5.1 surround mode (which sounds surprisingly good for a monaural original) or mono. Audio quality is good and, in the surround mode, there’s quite a bit of multichannel use.

Then there’s the pile of extras.

First up, on side one of the disc, is a running commentary featuring Dante and stars Wallace, Stone, and Robert Picardo (another Dante regular). Spread over the two sides of the disc are a photo gallery, documentaries, outtakes, deleted scenes, trailers, etc.

You also get an essay and some other stuff inside the liner notes.

It’s a complete and a welcome package that does justice to this classic of the horror/comedy genre. We loved it!

The Howling, from MGM Home Video
91 min. anamorphic widescreen (1.85:1, 16x9 TV compatible/Pan&Scan, Dolby Digital 5.1 surround/mono
Starring Dee Wallace, Patrick MacNee, Dennis Dugan, Christopher Stone, Belinda Balaski, Elisabeth Brooks
Produced by Michael Finnel and Jack Conrad
Written by John Sayles and Terence H. Winkless, directed by Joe Dante

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