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| David Naughton, Griffin Dunne, Jenny Agutter,
Brian Glover |
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Anamorphic
widescreen |
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Dolby Digital
5.1 |
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DTS |
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Trailer(s) |
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Featurette(s) |
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Documentary |
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Audio commentary
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Deleted scenes
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Concept art
/ storyboards |
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Multi-angle
feature |
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Jack
(Griffin Dunne): Have you ever talked to a corpse? It's boring!!
Two
American backpackers are attacked by a werewolf on the English moors,
and one of them soon finds himself transforming into a beastly creature.
 Werewolves
have always been a kind of second-rate villains in Hollywood horror
films, never tapping into the public mind the way other perennial favorites
like Frankenstein and Dracula have. But 1981 was a good year for these
hapless shapeshifters, perhaps the best year ever, as it saw the release
of two excellent tributes to the werewolf classics of old: Joe Dante's
The Howling and John Landis's An American Werewolf in London.
Both were helmed by directors with a passion for classic Hollywood,
and with a comedic edge very much in line with the era they delivered
their best work in. And each featured amazing make-up and transformation
effects courtesy of the two men whose reputations were firmly established
by their work on these two pictures.
The Howling is perhaps the true movie buff's choice, with its
many explicit references to the genre's history and John Sayles' tongue-in-cheek
screenplay. But the popular favorite remains An American Werewolf
in London, a simple update of the most classic werewolf formula,
with the additional jokes and make-up effects only just making it a
recognizable contemporary film. There's a disarming innocence to the
movie, a lack of pretention and irony that help make its romance sweetly
charming and its scares truly unsettling. It does occasionally become
overly silly, but at its modest running time it certainly doesn't wear
out its charm, and continues to live up to its reputation. |
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A
Region 1 movie-only release from Artisan Entertainment has gone out
of print, and has since been replaced by a Collector's Edition from
Universa [see separate
review]. A similar release is available for Region 2 and 4, missing
only the DTS sound mix, which served as a basis for this review.
The
anamorphic widescreen image is framed at an aspect ratio of approx.
1.85:1. Mastered from a new print of the film, the transfer here is
still rather disappointingly grainy and inconsistent, with irregular
shadow detail and quite a lot of damage artifacts on the source print.
Black levels are fairly solid, and this presentation is certainly the
best I've ever seen this movie seen. But those hoping for a pristinely
restored visual experience will be disappointed.
More impressive is the new surround mix created especially for this
release. Available on the disc in Dolby Digital 5.1, it won't give any
audio setup a huge workout, but it does a solid job separating the dialogues
from the music and the sound effects, some of which sound like they
have been re-recorded for this mix. Rear channels are used sparingly
but effectively for shock moments during the major action sequences,
and overall this surround mix does a good job of adding to the original
soundtrack without ever distracting from the movie.
Following
a movie-only DVD release and a period of very limited availability at
all, John Landis's comic horror classic now finally returns to DVD in
a nicely loaded Collector's Edition, though it's not quite as packed
with extras as some might expect.
The most enjoyable extra on the disc is the audio commentary
track featuring stars Griffin Dunne and David Naughton. The two male
leads provide a lively, informative and hugely entertaining audio track,
chatting in a very relaxed vein as the film triggers memories both good
and bad, and anecdotes aplenty. Director John Landis isn't a believer
in audio commentary tracks, but he does provide plenty of input during
a newly recorded 18-minute interview segment. Landis is animated
and a lively presence as always, and his enthusiastic remarks make for
an informative interview segment. There's also a ten-minute interview
with make-up designer Rick Baker, who won the first-ever Oscar for Best
Make-Up (his first of many) for the still-impressive make-up effects
in this film. His own remarks about his work on the film are surprisingly
self-deprecating, as if he no longer finds this at all impressive. He
discusses all the major special make-up effects in detail, amply illustrated
with footage from the film as well as several clips of unused effects
footage.
The original 1981 featurette is also on board, running a little
over five minutes and featuring some on-set footage and Landis emanating
his usual enthusiasm. It's a very enjoyable item, but disappointingly
short. The previously unseen item 'Casting of the Hand' on the
other hand is a bit long, running a full thirteen minutes as we follow
Baker, Landis and Naughton through the technical process of making a
cast of Naughton's hand. As it is completely without any narration or
other form of explanation, this fairly rough footage is enjoyable but
a bit of a stretch for the casual viewer. A four-minute selection of
outtakes includes some humorous footage of the crew fooling around
on-set as well as some other funny (and sometimes plain bizarre) items.
None of the clips have any sound, so the soundtrack instead features
the sound of a running film projector.
There's a storyboard-to-scene comparison for the action finale
around Piccaddilly Circus, which runs for about two-and-a-half minutes
with the storyboards in the upper left corner and the final scene in
the bottom right. There's also a photo montage that runs nearly
four minutes, presenting both production stills and behind-the-scenes
photography, accompanied by selections from Elmer Bernstein's score.
Production notes (also reproduced in the booklet) and cast
and crew filmographies are on board. Oddly enough, no trailers for
the film are included on this otherwise very respectable release.The
main menu screen has a fairly long animated montage of scenes from the
film, followed by a screen with some minimal animation accompanied by
some cues from the score. Navigation is a little clunky, with unelegant
subtitle selection screens preceding most extras.
Dan
Hassler-Forest
Reviewed: April
5, 2002
Click
here for IMDB info on An
American Werewolf in London.
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to return to the front page.
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