Night Of The Werewolf

Night Of The Werewolf Directed By Jack Molina (Paul Naschy) (1981)

          For this post I am trying to escape from Hong Kong and review something in the neglected category, a Spanish flick by the master of wolf-a-nomics Paul Naschy! This is only the third film by this underrated director on the blog.

          Elizabeth Bathory and a werewolf are sentenced by a tribunal and forced to wear the mask of dishonor for all eternity (Naschy steals alittle from Mario Bava's Black Sunday). Night of the Werewolf has a groovy little theme song that sounds like a 70's Drive in Intermission tune (Hurry back in with your popcorn). 

          Drunk swingers in speedos and bikinis lounge around by the pool in Rome, dismissing stupid anthropology and berate their sexy girlfriends. A professor and his eager student investigate the legend of Bathory and her lycanthrope inflicted servant, while two knuckleheads attempt to excavate their tombs. They remove the wolfs bane off of the werewolf tombs and are killed as the eager student carries out her wicked plans to resurrect Bathory. 

          Meanwhile three girls are accosted by bandits with shotguns who plan to rape them but are saved by a mysterious figure with a crossbow. They are also interested in the legend and hang out in the crypt which is slithering with snakes and rats. The werewolf (Naschy) in human form holds a crossbow, it turns out he's a good host and brings the girls into his castle. 

          There are tons of characters that are shortly introduced and then disappear and some lightning flashes and quick edits happen. Wolfman Paul starts up on his nightly feeding and kills a couple, he's the most chilaxed werewolf in film history and never loses his shit. Werewolves usually have a tendency to not want to change and murder people, but this one is cool with it. He also has a very Catholic half faced burn victim as his female servant. Bathory is pretty infested with rot to stroll around and remains on her cobwebbed strewn slab for most of the duration. The burned faced servant drives the wolf away with a huge cross, which shouldn't work on a werewolf, but Naschy is the Spaniard authority on werewolf folklore so I'll let it go. Erica the female student from the beginning is literally a cut throat and sells out her friends in order to give life to her lesbian crush Elizabeth Bathory. She finally wakes up and brings along an adorable mummy friend, who busts out of his grave. One pilgrim in an effort to end the misery has a suggestion to bring an "assload of garlic"!, great suggest sir, for a Vampire! Wolfman Paul builds a relationship with one of the cute girls, but he should probably tell her she's a necrophiliac (since he's undead). Bathory can control the werewolf so he's not able to stay a faithful boyfriend, it seems that he has returned from the dead to become a domesticated husband (yawn)! There's a very silly crepe hair Lon Chaney style stop motion transformation scene. Naschy sort of cut and pastes all the different monster legends together but all in all its a pretty fun trip. It ends with a slo-mo fight between Liz and the wolf and a vicious betrayal. Check it out only if you have a soft spot for monsters.   

WATCH HERE  

I'm Roger the adorable mummy

Thats Gotta Hurt!

Slowly waiting for the blood to drain Yawn!