Karen White (Dee Wallace) is a television news anchor in Los Angeles. She is being stalked by a serial killer nick-named Eddie the Mangler. As part of a police stake-out Karen agrees to meet Eddie in a porn shop. Karen’s scream results in a trigger happy young cop shooting Eddie through a peep show door. The trauma of the event causes Karen to block out what occurred. Her therapist, Dr. George Waggner (Patrick Macnee), suggests she take a few days off and visit a place he owns called The Colony. He tells her that a few days there will help her get over her trauma. Karen and her husband Bill Neill (Christopher Stone) agree to go.
The Colony is a retreat filled with weird people. Right away strange things start to happen. Cattle mutilations in the area bring the sheriff, Sam Newfield (Slim Pickens). Karen hears wolf howls in the night. One of people at the colony is a nymphomaniac named Marsha that hits on Karen’s husband Bill. Erle Kenton (John Carradine) is an old man who has suicidal thoughts and Marsha’s brother T.C. (Don McLeod) is just plain creepy.
Back in the city Karen’s co-workers, Terry Fisher (Belinda Balaski) and Chris Halloran (Dennis Dugan), continue the investigation into Eddie the Mangler. They find out that his name is Eddie Quist. When they go to the morgue to talk to the coroner’s assistant they find out that Eddie’s body is missing.
At the Colony Marsha makes a pass at Bill. He rebuffs her and leaves. On his way back to his cabin he is attacked and bitten by a wolf. Karen gets scared and calls Terry to ask her to come up to the Colony. Terry gets there the next day. That next night Bill and Marsha meet in the woods. While having sex, they both turn into werewolves.
Terry figures out that Eddie the Mangler is connected to the Colony because of a drawing Eddie did that depicts the ocean view from the grounds of the Colony. Terry is attacked by a werewolf but escapes. She searches the doctor’s office and calls Chris. While on the phone with Chris Terry is attacked and killed by another werewolf. Over the phone Chris hears what is going on and high tails it to the Colony, silver bullets in hand.
“The Howling” was released in 1981 and was directed by Joe Dante. It took awhile to get to the actual werewolves but there was plenty of spooky stuff along the way to keep you interested. When you get to Eddie’s transformation, it is stunning. I liked this movie a lot more than I thought I would.
Rick Baker was originally doing the special effects for this movie, but had to leave to do “An American Werewolf in London” (1981), leaving the effects job to assistant Rob Bottin. Both this movie and "American Werewolf" were released the same year and both received praise for their makeup work. There are a lot of similarities in the transformation scenes between the two movies. The main difference is that the werewolves in “The Howling” are two footed and the werewolf in “American Werewolf in London” is of the four footed variety. There is one animated section where Bill and Marsha are having werewolf sex.
Dee Wallace (Karen White) and Christopher Stone (Bill Neill) were engaged in real life when shooting the movie.
Several of the characters in the movie are named after directors of other werewolf movies; George Waggner, Roy William Neill, Terence Fisher, Freddie Francis, Erle C. Kenton, Sam Newfield, Charles Barton, Jerry Warren, Lew Landers and Jacinto Molina (one of Paul Naschy’s pseudonyms ).
Roger Corman has a cameo as a man waiting to use a phone booth after Karen White (Dee Wallace). Forrest J. Ackerman has a cameo as a bookstore customer carrying a copy of his magazine "Famous Monsters of Filmland". Writer John Sayles has a cameo as a morgue attendant.