Directed & Edited by: Joe Dante Written by: John Sayles & Terence H. Winkless Gary Bradner (Novel) Starring: Dee Wallace .... Karen White Patrick Macnee .... Dr. George Waggner Dennis Dugan .... Chris Christopher Stone .... R. William (Bill) Neill Belinda Balaski .... Terry Fisher Kevin McCarthy .... Fred Francis John Carradine .... Erle Kenton Slim Pickens .... Sam Newfield Elisabeth Brooks .... Marsha Quist Robert Picardo .... Eddie Quist Noble Willingham .... Charlie Barton James Murtaugh .... Jerry Warren Release Date: Theatrical: January 21, 1981 (France); March 13, 1981 (New York); April 10 1981 (North American Nationwide) *Images courtesy at: www.moviescreenshots.blogspot.com Rating:

A TV newswoman named Karen White (Dee Wallace) meets up with a killer named Eddie Quist (Robert Picardo) in an Xrated movie theatre as he has some personal discussions he needs to sort out with her.
Suddenly she spots something terrifying about him and then she nearly encounters a death with the serial killer.
She keeps having nightmares about that horrible incident and her shrink Dr. George Waggner (Patrick Macnee) sends her and her husband Bill (Christopher Stone) to a retreatment center after she can't shake the awful feeling and to get rid of her amnesia while some coroners do some researching on the corpses the killer created on them with look like animal marks.

The retreatment centre is in a small village out in the woods by the ocean. There she has group therapy hosted by Waggner.
She finds the surroundings there friendly but very strange with the residents there especially when night time comes around as she hears terrible howling sounds.

She keeps having terrifying nightmares of what is going to happen there and then discovers that the village there is invaded by werewolves and also realises that she is in more danger there than the incident with the killer Eddie because even her husband is turned into a werewolf himself after being briefly attacked by one.

The film has some humor at first to make the viewers who gets scared easily to relax as that's just what happens when the film starts to roll as it becomes very serious with the terror on the werewolves.
The film has terrific werewolf effects whenever someone turns into one too.
Werewolf film became popular during this time period due to this one as well as An American Werewolf in London.

The acting is very well done as Dee Wallace really steals the ashow with her performance by her freaked out wemotions on the wolves howling and being the target for a serial killer too in the beginning of this film. Her ending scene in the newsroom as she has a terrifying secret is a true classic and will always be remembered. After this she played the Mom in E.T.
The late Christopher Stone (Bless his soul) is great too as her husband and really performs well when he turns slowly into a werewolf too.
We also have British character actor Patrick Macnee who is perfect as a deceiving psychiatrist with a secret evil twist to him towards the end of the film.

A porn actress is gagged on screen at an X rated movie theatre and her breasts and full body shot are exposed.
Elisabeth Brooks takes off her cloak near a bonfire and is naked from the top to the bottom while there are some brief butt shots by Christopher Stone's character as the two starts to fornicate before turning into werewolves.

There is some guts at a mortuary when they research an attack by the killer.
A werewolfs hand is chopped off by an axe and looks quite gruesome too as the hand is still moving.
A woman's throat is sliced open by werewolf claws and then she is later seen gutted and torn apart.
A guys face is torn while he becomes a werewolf.

Joe Dante is amazing with his direction for a werewolf film bringing on the terror with this one.
He shows great direction with his actors as the locals in the deep dark woods as well as showing them turning into terrifying werewolves with excellent camera shots on Stone and Brooks after their sex scene together.
Also he makes the scene very bone chilling when the werewolves are howling at night and Dee Wallace's character is spooked out staying in her cabin.
His shots with the actors in the woods is spine tingling too.
If Joe hasn't won an award for this piece then he deserves one.

Pino Donaggio composed the music beautifully with classical sounds of violin and other stuff which really works great for this film.
He is a true classic gem for this music.
He has also composed music for various foreign films too.

The Special Edition DVD Features:

• Available Subtitles: English, Spanish, French
• Available Audio Tracks: English (Dolby Digital 5.1), English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono)
• Commentary by: director and castUnknown Format
• "Unleashing the Beast": all-new documentary
• "Making a Monster Movie: Inside The Howling" featurette
• Deleted scenes
• Outtakes and more

U.S.A.	VHS	DVD
Canada	VHS	DVD
U.K.	VHS	DVD
Germany	VHS	DVD
France	DVD

Bill Neill: I'm looking for my wife.
Marsha Quist: Why?

[looking in what was Eddie Quist's morgue locker]
Chris: He's not here!
Morgue Attendant: He was here this morning!
Terry Fisher: (noticing the damage on the inside of the locker door) Look at the door!
Chris: You think somebody took him?
Morgue Attendant: Well, he didn't just get up and walk away!

Karen: There was howling just a minute ago.
Bill Neill: It was probably somebody's stray dog.
Karen: It didn't sound like any dog I've ever heard before.
Bill Neill: Honey, you're from Los Angeles. The wildest thing you've ever heard is Wolfman Jack. This is the country.

[On how to kill werewolves]
Bookstore owner: Silver bullets or fire, that's the only way to get rid of the damn things. They're worse than cockroaches.

Bookstore owner: [talking about his occult bookstore] The Manson people used to hang out here and shoplift!

Eddie Quist: (to Chris) Hello, bright boy.

Chris: Eddie?
Eddie Quist: You know me, but I don't know you. Why is that?

Eddie Quist: Don't you know anything?

Chris: You're crazy!
Eddie Quist: Oh, I'm much more than that!

Eddie Quist: I'm gonna give you a piece of my mind. I trusted you, Karen. (proceeds to pull a piece of his skull out a bullet hole in his head)

Erle Kenton: You can't tame what's meant to be wild, doc. It just ain't natural.

Chris: I've got silver bullets in here. (points rifle)
Jerry Warren: Silver bullets my ass! Get up, T.C.!

Dr. George Waggner: Thank God! (drops to the ground)

Fred Francis: [on the phone after Karen freezes during a newscast] Who knows? Maybe she's pregnant. Listen, get in touch with that Fujiama, Fujimoto, or whatever the hell her name is and get her ready for the 11:00 report.

Erle Kenton: We should have stuck with the old ways. Raising cattle for our feed. Where's the life in that?
Charlie Barton: Humans *are* our cattle.
Erle Kenton: Humans are our *prey*. We should feed on them, like we've always done. Screw all this "channel your energies" crap.