Customer Reviews

House of the Wolf Man

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

House of the Wolfman, a flashback to those classic horror films of the 30's and 40's. Filmed in glorious Black & White, the opening title sequence screams "Old school" monster movie. However the rest of the film is very slow, the acting is "stagey" at best, the plot very weak. The movie drips with great atmosphere and music. The Frankenstein Monster and Wolfman make-up are top notch, only we have to wait until the last 10 min to see them??!! The old lady in the attic, the "nosferatu" vampire brides all offer some errie chills! There is so much more that this film could have been. Dracula, The Wolfman and Frankenstein's monster...how could this combination be bad? Unfortunately, this movie will show you....as I said in the tile of this review...a missed opportunity indeed!

Let me start with the good stuff. I grew up on Universal monster films and was eager to see this attempt at finishing the "House of..." cycle. It captures the atmosphere of the period quite well, the full-orchestra score is dead on, and the monsters all look terrific. So do the sets and the miniature castle shot at the open is as good as any from the classic movies. This movie was clearly made lovingly by true fans, and that warns my soul. Nods to Universal abound, such as cutaways to the Creature From the Black Lagoon skeleton on a table, alongside the glass dome contain the now dead and decomposed King homunculus from Bride of Frankenstein.

However, the script is laborious, it rough going even at 74 minutes. When I was an hour and five minutes into it and still no monsters had shown, I knew we were in trouble. Up to that point, it plays more like one of those Monogram mystery films more than Universal. Things pick up when the monsters arrive, they look just great. You can see the seams on the Frankenstein make-up, but the design is terrific and the black and white photography obscures some of the flaws. There is no real setup for the monster, he just staggers in for the obligatory (and well staged) fight with the wolfman. Dracula appears, too, right at the end and for apparently no reason.

The story falls apart when the creatures appear, but it's what we are here for, and the preceding hour is completely forgotten at that point. Apparently by the film makers as well.

The acting from everyone is over the top, probably intentionally, but it is taken too far. Watch the old Universal films. The acting styles may be more stagey than we see today, but they are well-played by actors who believed what they were doing and consequently made you believe. These guys are playing a campy style, and it is at odds with my respect for the old films. Ron Chaney, here of course for his name alone, is the worst violator. His annoying monotone gets very old very fast and he is completely incapable of carrying the titular role.

The sole exception the late Michael R. Thomas as Dracula, who seems to be channelling Lugosi. Too bad there isn't more of him.

All that said, if you are a fan of these old movies, and they are your touchstone in life, as they are for me, then you can't afford to miss this uneven film with a big heart squarely in the right place.

Was so excited to finally be able to see this film on DVD. The production design is superb and the "bad acting" was on the money, unfortunately the pacing of the movie is dreadfully slow and the script itself is very weak. It plods along for over an hour before the monsters appear, and then it comes to an abrupt end. I really want my money back on this one. The trailer was far better than the actual movie.

It's so hard for me to come down on this well meaning little homage to the great and not so great Universal Monster films I grew up with. Where do I begin?.....with the bad?...or the good? Well...since I would like to end on a positive note, lets start with THE BAD. Ron Chaney is a terrible actor, and he and a few of the black servants destroy what could have been a very enjoyable little tribute to the old fashioned horror films, even though the script is tedious most of the cast seem to be having fun with it.

I don't want to beat up on Chaney here, but he just doesn't seem to have a clue? He is so stiff and bizarre that it just takes you out of the entire fantasy. ditto the two servants there lines are so robotic, it just ruins the experience.

THE GOOD news is this film has atmosphere to spare, if you can forgive these three actors for being caught acting! The Monster make-up is very good and the final fight between Frankie and Wolfie is better than the original in Frankenstein meets the Wolf Man! .....sure it's a little hokey, but isn't it supposed to be? It's a shame because with a little bigger budget and some decent actors this could have been the best vintage horror release of the year!

I had been wanting to make a film like this one on my own until news came out that someone else had beaten me to it. With that knowledge, I decided to spend a little money on the DVD when it came out. The trailer looked awesome, the behind the scenes story seemed good, and the film actually has Ron Chaney (Grandson of the real Wolf Man). I knew he wasn't gonna be a great actor, seeing how the man had no experience and is a farmer, and monster movies don't require great acting any way. But this movie had no good acting in it at all, except perhaps for the plucky comic relief, who hams up his nerdy-ness in an authentic 1940s fashion. The filmmakers took great pains in making the sets, editing, photography, writing, and blocking to look as authentic to the 1940s as possible with today's equipment, but fall short in many ways. It's photographed in HD, and thus has a lot of video grain because it was shooting high-contrast lighting, and lots of darkness. The actors all attempt the same campy style acting of the period, but they all end up sounding too modern. This is only forgivable for the actress playing Elmira, because she's hot. The only ethnic people are the footmen, who are blatently expendable and ridiculed in a racist manner. Perhaps this was done to add to the authenticity, but it fails to make us really like the picture any more. The makeup is terrific, but the monsters don't show up until the end of the film. And audiences going to see this kind of movie really are there to see the monsters. With a little editing, and extra foley work, the monster fight at the end could have been so much better, but it ends up just looking like a couple of stunt men in suits beating the crap out of one another. The screenplay had potential, I admit, but the whole first act takes up almost three quarters of the picture, while the second act is almost ignored, and the third just kind of ends the film abruptly. It's not the kind of movie that is so bad it's good, like an MST3K entry, because that's what they were attempting from the start and it just fails even at that. I was probably expecting a kind of spoof on this genre, like Larry Blamire's Lost Skeleton films, but it doesn't even do that. It's a movie that tries so hard to be the kind of movie we used to love, and just fails, and this saddens me greatly.

Reed and Mary arrive at Castle Reinhardt along with several other guests that have been invited to stay for the weekend by its mysterious owner, Dr. Bela Reinhardt, who intends on testing his new subjects in order to decide which of them shall inherit the estate and all of its secrets... HOUSE OF THE WOLF MAN is an experimental film that brings together swirling mists, stage lightning, dark Gothic centerpieces, and many other classic elements to form a stylized black and white production that captures the pure essence and aesthetic of the Golden Age of Horror, right down to the title cards and score. It boasts many familiar characters and monsters, including the old witch, the hunchbacked butler, the mad scientist, and of course, Dracula, The Wolf Man, and Frankenstein's Monster! The Monster FX make-up team takes on the daunting taste of redesigning the creatures for themselves, creating a vintage look with a modern twist for each of them. HOUSE is filled with campy performances that also try to recapture the look and feel of Old Hollywood, but each of the individual cast members appear to have rehearsed separately with their own differing accents and dialects. Ron Chaney is unable to match the abilities of his grandfather, and delivers a weak lead as the central villain. What HOUSE OF THE WOLF MAN shares most in common with its Universal counterparts FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLF MAN or HOUSE OF FRANKENSTEIN is the minimal amount of monster mayhem found only in the final moments of the film. Aside from these distractions, Eben McGarr's ambitious attempt comes together quite well in the end, making HOUSE OF THE WOLF MAN a must-see for Gothic film fans!

-Carl Manes
I Like Horror Movies

Let's get one thing out of the way: I love the Wolf Man! He was always my favorite classic Universal monster, largely due to Lon Chaney Jr.'s sympathetic portrayal of the monster's human form, Larry Talbot. When I first heard the title "House of the Wolf Man," I was positively giddy with anticipation.

Then I watched the movie.

(Minor Spoilers ahead)
A group of five seemingly disparate strangers accept the invitation to spend the night at the castle of one Dr. Reinhardt (Ron Chaney, the grandson of Lon Jr.). Cue the cliches: Stormy night, disfigured assistant, things that go bump in night, etc. And to their credit, the filmmakers do mangage to more or less successfully copy the look of a 1940's-era Universal horror film. The appearance of Reinhardt's quadraplegic grandmother serves to offer some legitmate connections (ludicrous though they may seem) to the "real" Wolf Man films. You see, she's the brother of the Bela character from the original film (Bela Lugosi gets a cameo in a portrait hanging on the wall). And Reinhardt's own lineage is, well. . .I won't give it all away.

House of the Wolf Man, with all its good intentions, has two major flaws. The script doesn't really go anywhere. Almost NOTHING happens in the first half hour. And as others have pointed out, the monsters don't show up until the final 10 minutes (more on that in a minute). But what almost sinks the film from the beginning is the horrible acting. Sadly, the one person from whom we might reasonably expect a decent performance (Chaney) proves the worst of the bunch. And this isn't bad acting on purpose, as seen in parodies like The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra. It's just. . .well, it's bad.

If there's a saving grace here, it's that the monsters DO deliver when they finally appear. For anyone who was disppointed with the 30 second melee between the Wolf Man and Frankenstein's Monster in Frankenstein Meets the Wolfman [VHS], there's some real action to be found here. A last-minute inexplicable appearance by Dracula adds to the feel that we are, for a brief shining moment, back in that world that we classic monsters fans hold so dear. This thought is really brought home in the abrupt ending, a flaw shared by many of the later Universal films. Oh, and bonus points for blink-and-you'll-miss-it homages to Creature from the Black Lagoon and Dr. Pretorious's creations from Bride of Frankenstein.

Like I said, I'm a fan. And believe me, 3 stars is VERY generous for this film. If you love the old monster movies, it is worth a look. But you'll have to be very forgiving of its flaws if you are to find any enjoyment here. I actually hope the disc sells well, as its success could pave the way for other such projects. Let's just hope the filmmakers invest more time and money on hiring some better talent.

I've wanted to see this "movie" since I heard about it. And now that I finally have, I wish I could get my money back. DO NOT BE FOOLED. This is exactly 12 minutes of monsters. The rest of this 75 minute exercise in torture, is some of the worst dialog ever written acted out by some of the weakest actors ever to be filmed. It's not even funny bad...it's just slow, painful and boring.

If you're a classic movie monsters fan, you'll love the effort that went into this film. It's meant to be the "lost" third film in Universal Pictures' monster mash-up "House of ..." series, and is set in 1946. Ron Chaney, grandson of Lon Chaney, Jr., stars as Dr. Bela Reinhart. He's invited five people to his remote castle, and he will pick one of them as his heir. Little do they know they are all his children, and that he himself is really a Frankenstein. Most of the movie plays as an old dark house mystery. The monster mayhem doesn't really get going until the last 15 minutes of the story. The acting isn't that great, but the attention to detail is amazing. The late Michael R. Thomas, however, gives an impressive performance as Count Dracula in the film's final minutes, and it's dedicated to his memory. The monster make-ups are quite excellent, too. If Chaney can polish his performing skills a bit, I'd be up for a sequel!

I am a huge Universal monster fan. It is quite apparent that the folks who made this movie love them, too. The film was made to resemble a 1930s Universal film with lots of creepy castle time and fog. The acting is a bit weak, but it's all about the monsters, folks! Without doubt, the highlight is the Frankenstein-Wolfman battle in the climax. This one makes up for the short fight in the original Frankenstein meets the Wolfman movie. So, sit back with some popcorn, turn off the lights and revisit the melodramatic
atmosphere of the past and visit The House of the Wolfman.