Full Moon Features: Night of the Howling Beast

Night of the Howling Beast

Night of the Howling BeastBefore I tackle the rest of Paul Naschy’s “Hombre Lobo” series, I’d like to highlight one entry in particular that may be a little hard to come by since it’s never been released on DVD, but it’s definitely worth the effort to track down. That film is 1975’s Night of the Howling Beast, which was originally called La Maldicion de la Bestia (literally “The Curse of the Beast”) and also went out as Hall of the Mountain King (a somewhat nonsensical title) and The Werewolf and the Yeti (which is rather more germane since there is a scene at the end where Naschy’s Waldemar Daninsky fights a yeti). Directed by Miguel Iglesias (who’s credited under the not-fooling-anyone pseudonym of M.I. Bonns), the film opens with an incredibly brief and chaotic yeti attack, after which we’re whisked off to London. There Waldemar — a noted anthropologist and psychologist who just happens to be fluent in Nepalese — is recruited by an old professor (Castillo Escalona) for an expedition to the Himalayas to continue the work of the first expedition (shades of Monty Python’s “Sir George Head” sketch). Of course, the main attraction for Waldemar may be the presence of the professor’s beautiful daughter/assistant, Sylvia (Grace Mills). (And no, the fact that he knew her as a child isn’t creepy at all.)

As one might expect, things don’t really get rolling until the expedition reaches Nepal and Waldemar decides to scout ahead with a skittish local guide. When they reach the Pass of the Demons of the Red Moon his guide freaks out and disappears, leaving Waldemar to wander on his own until he finds sanctuary in a cave inhabited by two hot priestesses who nurse him back to health. After some disturbing dreams he discovers that they’re cannibals who worship a skeleton with fangs, kills one with a silver dagger and is bitten by the other before he can dispatch her. Thus having contracted the curse of the beast, he stumbles out of the cave in just a shirt, which would be a problem if he didn’t sprout fur and fangs that night during the full moon.

Meanwhile, there is unrest back at camp since one of the expedition’s Sherpas (Gaspar ‘Indio’ González) keeps warning them about the bandits that could attack them at any time. Waldemar kills three of them the first time he transforms and even chows down on Nathan (Juan Velilla), the group’s main naysayer, after he gets drunk and tries to paw Sylvia. Naturally, when the professor and the others discover Nathan’s body the next morning they think it could be the work of a yeti, but they are soon set upon by more bandits and there is a big shootout, during which Sylvia escapes and the professor and Melody (Verónica Miriel), the other female in the group, are captured. Alas, the bandits are less interested in poor Larry Talbot (Gil Vidal) — yes, Naschy went ahead and used the name of the most famous werewolf in history for a minor character in the film — but we don’t find out his fate until the next day, after Waldemar has reunited with Sylvia after slaughtering some more bandits in his bestial form.

When Waldemar and Sylvia find Larry he’s been impaled on a spike and begs to be put out of his misery (much like Lon Chaney, Jr. frequently did), but before he expires he tells them the bandits have taken the professor and Melody to the palace of the ailing Sekkar Khan (Luis Induni), who is attended by the sadistic Wandesa (Silvia Solar), a foreigner who delights in having people tortured and is stringing the Khan along. On their way to the palace Waldemar and Sylvia stop at an abandoned monastery where an old man tells them of the only cure for Waldemar’s condition (which involves the red petals of a magic flowering plant and the blood of a young girl), but before they can seek it out they are captured and taken to the palace, where Wandesa announces her intention to dominate Waldemar and make him her slave by having Melody skinned alive before his eyes. Before the full moon comes, though, Sylvia and the other female prisoners effect an escape and Waldemar is freed in time to have two protracted fights — one in human form with the Khan and the other in his more feral state with a yeti that tries to abduct Sylvia. Sadly, the creature’s shaggy costume looks decidedly off-the-rack, but that doesn’t make much of a difference since it’s hard to make out much detail against the blinding white snow. I’d say a DVD restoration is in order, but that seems about as likely as Waldemar Daninsky rolling over and playing dead.

Werewolf Wednesday Theme: Big & Beastly

Hi everyone! This weeks theme is up so draw whatever comes to mind when you think, Big & Beastly. You know, anything besides the Beast from Beauty and the Beast or Beast from X-Men, the Hulk… okay, okay, let’s stick to werewolves here people. Be creative, share your art in the comments, and as always,  have fun!

edit by Andrew: Tandye will be Livestreaming a werewolf-themed drawing & chat session at her Livestream page today, starting at 2 PM Pacific. Come hang out!

86 sheep found slaughtered in France – Facebook cryptozoology group says it’s werewolves

Reader Nyetwerke shares this short article from France’s The Local: Town hunts werewolves after sheep attacks.

A flock of ewes were found dead by their owners, savagely killed and often with their throats cut, in the town of Les Mauges, near Nantes. Locals speculated a wild dog or a wolf may be to blame.

I’m thinking the locals are probably correct, but a sizeable Facebook group called Sauvons les loups garous français (“Save the French werewolves”) – created by Adrien Collineau and Martin Crépon – says the deaths are the result of werewolves who have “returned” to France, and that need to be saved. My French is terrible so I can’t tell exactly what’s going on there, but the images and videos posted to the group and its sister site all have a do-it-yourself aesthetic that makes me wonder if Adrien and Martin are serious, if they’re having fun… or if they’re trying to distract people from all the lambchops they’re selling out the back door.

Special hat + iPad = you got a werewolf head

The hat is a beanie called a Zaphat, and the logo on the front acts as a target for an iOS app that will render a 3D model “mask” over your head. One of the masks that it (presumably) ships with is a werewolf, who reacts accordingly when you poke it in the nose.

The company behind this gimmicky (but cool) technology is Zappar, who “make bite-sized entertainment experiences using our proprietary image recognition”. The Zaphat will hit retail “real soon”, at which point you’ll be able to purchase additional masks based on original and licensed properties.

I don’t spend a lot of time just starting at people through my iPad, but if augmented reality garments go mainstream, I might have to start! (Zappar, if you want this to go mainstream, please use models who don’t look like extras from Jesse Pinkman’s crew).

“The Cabin in the Woods” is out on Blu-ray & DVD now, so you can freeze frame the werewolf scenes

The Cabin in the Woods, front-runner for “Andrew’s Favourite Movie of 2012” and recipient of the Quinton Mark of Excellence in Werewolf Design, is now available for purchase in basically any format you like. Amazon has it in Blu-ray, DVD and Instant Video formats, and it’s in the iTunes store so you can watch it on your iPhone 5’s huge screen. All but the Instant Video formats come with bonus features that will undoubtedly contain making-of featurettes and image galleries showcasing the film’s menagerie of monsters, including the vicious, supernaturally fast (and some might ague, pivotal) werewolf.

On the subject of creature effects, Fangoria has a long and detailed interview with CITW makeup FX designer David Leroy Anderson. He mentions the werewolf at several points, including this passage in which he talks about how important it was to choose the right people to work on each monster.

The people that were working on the Werewolf, it was Norman Cabrera and Matt Rose, and they’re legendary in this industry. He [Rose] just has such a passion about werewolves, the whole history of them, so there was no disputing he should be the man in charge of it.

Apropos of nothing, I would like to mention that I am available as a consultant, and my rates are quite reasonable.

Michael Dorn to play werewolf in revived “Castlevania” film

In an interview on Startrek.com, actor Michael Dorn mentions that 1) there’s finally going to be a Castlevania movie, and 2) he’s playing a small role in it, as a werewolf who’s “been around for a gajillion years”.

Castlevania is a movie that Marina got me involved with. It’s based on a video game. People have been trying to get this thing done for a long time and they finally got the producers together that want to do it. They finally got the OK from the owners, and so they’re doing it. It’s a fun little part. It’s four days, and I’m playing a werewolf that’s been around for a gajillion years who works for this vampire. It’s not too far from Worf because there’s a lot of killing and jumping and sword fights and everything.

According to this Kotaku post from 2010 there have been several attempts to bring Castlevania to the big screen, but nothing’s gotten off the ground until now. No word on which team got their project green-lit, but it’s probably not Paul W.S. Anderson, who’s going to be busy making a different monster hunter movie based on a video game franchise.

I have to admit that I haven’t seen Dorn in anything other than Star Trek, but he’s got a great voice and an imposing physical presence. I’m looking forward to seeing him made up, werewolf-style!

Pre-Code Comics: The Wolpire

I hope you enjoyed my pre-Code comics countdown of favorite werewolf stories.  I wish there were more, but that would require time travel, and my DeLorean’s in the shop.

That said, there’s one more incredible story to share. Just not “Bravo!” incredible. More like “Why has God forsaken me?” incredible.

From March 1954, The Wolpire tries to be many things: horrific, patriotic, romantic, even 3-D! It succeeds at, um, using a lot of yellow ink. I admit a flying yellow man in a speedo sounds scary. I just can’t explain what that has to do with werewolves and neither can the writer.

Thanks one more time to Karswell for hosting this and other stories. If you like them, seriously, leave him a comment already.

And yes: argyle is awesome.

Werewolf News was taken down by vampires

If you tried visiting Werewolf-News.com any time between Tuesday afternoon and late Wednesday morning, you probably weren’t able to get to the site, or if you were, you got an unhelpful PHP error. This happened because of vampires.

Well, not really. It happened because my web host had a non-specific and totally fixable “issue” – one they can’t (or won’t) explain. One that took this and every other site I host down for 17 hours. One that they wanted to credit me $3 for when I complained. I have no proof that the company involved is run by vampires, but I don’t know how else one would explain that level of weak-kneed dip-shittery. So, vampires, right?

Everything seems to be fine now, but I am in the process of moving this site (and all the others) for the second time in two weeks – only this time I’m not moving from server to server at the same company. I’m moving to a new host. The transfer should hopefully go smoothly, and once Werewolf News and its brothers and sisters are safe in their new home, I’ll be able to spend my “personal project” time posting new stuff here instead of yelling at unhelpful tech support agents.

Thanks for your patience and support, and if you see any vampires, please kick their asses for me.

Pre-Code Comics: Werewolf Valley

Illustration by Alright Owl

Does your skin itch? Do your teeth ache? It’s time for first place in the all-lycanthrope pre-Code comics countdown.

There’s a strange disconnect with werewolves. I don’t know about you, but I find the idea of werewolves sexy. Very sexy. And yet, I can’t tell you the last portrayal of a werewolf I found even slightly sexy.

Even in Werewolves of the Rockies, Fria went from blond bombshell to bony bipedal rat-thing. I know werewolves are supposed to be monsters, but can’t they at least look like wolves?

Now rewind to April 1952, when America was much more worried about deforestation than werewolves. Wait, that was some other America so, how to explain Werewolf Valley? All I know is, if Marta offered me coffee, I wouldn’t hesitate even if it were decaf.

Thanks again to Karswell for hosting this at The Horrors of It All. Next time: the worst pre-Code werewolf!

Today’s Great Showdown by Scott C.: “Even a man who is pure in heart…”

As I’ve previously mentioned on Werewolf News, artist Scott C. and his ongoing series of Great Showdowns are the sources of, like, 75% of my Internet-delivered smiles. Today’s Showdown is an “old timey jammer” that perfectly (and literally) illustrates Scott’s knack for capturing epic film confrontations in the most agreeable way possible.

EVERYBODY’S SMILING.

http://greatshowdowns.com/post/31000678998/even-a-man-who-is-pure-in-heart-and-says-his