First off, check out this theme song. Does that really make you want to watch a scary werewolf movie?
Another Howling, another sequel unrelated to the last. Despite *really* hating part 3, I was oddly anticipating part 4. Maybe I'm just a glutton for punishment. And it definitely isn't a good movie. But it's kind of a good "bad movie," at least for a little while. It's interesting: part 3 tries to be funny and ends up being seriously bad, and part 4 tries to be serious and ends up funny bad.
But if you're a fan of terrible dubbing, I think you'll find a lot to like. I was recently watching the extras for From Beyond, and its director Stuart Gordon was talking about shooting in Italy, and how the carpenters constructing the sets would just keep building and being noisy while they were shooting. Apparently, it is (or at least was) standard practice in Italy to shoot without sound and dub it all in later. I knew a lot of my favorite Italian flicks were dubbed, but I didn't know it was like that on purpose. I just love that slightly surreal vibe that overdubbed dialogue brings to a film - which, in hindsight, could be part of why I love Italian horror so much. Long story short, much of Howling 4 is overdubbed, and rather poorly. It could be on purpose, but I like to imagine they lost the recording equipment half-way through filming or something. It's either a lot worse in the first half-hour or you get used to it as the film goes on. Either way, I was howling with laughter (ha!) for most of Act One.
But other than the dubbing and this guy:
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| such an asshole |
(who is such an asshole to his wife it's laughable), there isn't much to like here. Even if you're like "hey, I like werewolves" - you don't even see any of those until an hour into things. (note: in real life, it's not funny to be an asshole to your spouse. But if you're a cheeseball actor in a shitty movie, yeah, it's funny.) Our dear friend above does, at one point, rock a rarely seen denim trifecta - the jeans, a denim shirt, and a cutoff denim vest. The Amazing Denim Jacket approves!
Anyway, the story. Marie (Romy Windsor) is a semi-famous novelist who who suffers a nervous breakdown - she's having hallucinations of crazy nuns and random flashes of violent acts. Her doctor tells her asshole husband Richard (Michael T. Weiss) to take her away from the city so she can get some peace and quiet far from the stimulation of the modern world. He finds an isolated little cottage in the small town of Drago. However, rather than relax, she starts to hear howling and begins seeing even more mysterious visions. When the friendly former nun Janice (Susanne Severeid) shows up, Marie is dragged into a mystery involving Janice's missing friend/co-nun - who happens to be the same woman Marie was seeing in her visions while she was in the city! You can probably guess that werewolves are involved too... well, how would you feel about Satanic werewolves? But don't get your hopes up - it sounds cool but they don't do anything with it.
So yeah, it's just not very good. Some of the badness is funny - the dubbing, the confusing day-for-night shots, the over-acting (the grumpy sheriff in particular). But most of the badness is just plain bad. The annoying "eerie" music that plays far too often, a convoluted story (bringing up and then failing to deliver on Satanic werewolves is a big no-no for me), and really terrible editing.
The editing actually deserves special mention. The scary/gory things get cut away from so quickly that there were times I thought the may be going for a PG-13 or something (although the nudity would imply otherwise). But then late in the film there is a *really* graphic scene of a guy melting into a puddle - it's probably the best thing in the movie. But it's so out of place. Like you know that part of werewolf lore where the bite victim melts into a puddle, totally disappears, and then rises from the puddle as a werewolf? Me either. It's a super cool effect, but it really reeks of "hey - we figured out how to do this neat effect. Let's put it in the movie!" It really belongs in a zombie film, or something. At any rate Howling 4 really skimps on the gore for almost all of the movie, then totally goes for broke here. It's a bit jarring, even though it looks cool.
Also, since I'm kind of dork, I've noticed a lot of dogs in horror movies. Usually just as monster fodder. But, since this is the internet and people like pictures of pets, I thought I'd screen grab them and tell you a little about them. Also, if they live or die, since that's something some people would want to know. Our first contestant, Pierre:
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| Pierre |
Name: Pierre
Breed: Some kind of small poodle mix
Function: to get lost in the woods, and give Marie something to worry about.
Fate: Killed, presumably by werewolf. We see a very brief shot of his severed head :-(
So, there isn't really much worth seeking out in The Howling 4. One good effects scene and funny ADR does not a do the job. It's a marginal improvement over part 3, but that's about the faintest praise you can give.
I would not recommend this film.
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