Simply A Masterpiece

If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

The original Howling movie was a classic. The sequals have paled in comparison and Howling 3 was a joke. Howling 5 is very good, and had its moments. Being inside a very old medieval castle and trapped, while each person is killed one by one is chilling. This was a tense and almost dark movie. The very beginning scene showed a massacre of dead people from the year 1489 in the castle. Then it switched to 1989 and a selected group of strangers go on a bus to stay in a castle. Inside the castle is a werewolf but which one of those people is it? I know, but not saying.

Finally someone has the cajones to put werewolves in a castle and initiate murder mystery slasher mode. My god, how did it take till 1989 to kick this into gear? And what fun we have here!At least in terms of a C-movie eclectic character cast and some cool castle cinematography. This is a murder mystery where you don't really care about the reveal, and you know it's a werewolf anyway so the why isn't important. It's also a slasher where there's not much bloodletting or fun. It lies somewhere flatly in-between these two genres that share so much in common and yet can't meet a happy middle ground.

Count Istvan (Philip Davis) invites nine strangers to an isolated Hungarian castle that has been closed down for 500 years after everyone inside was slaughtered save for a baby. Among the guests invited to the opening are photographer David Gillespie (Ben Cole), doctor Catherine Peake (Victoria Catlin), airhead aspiring actress Marylou Summers (Elizabeth Shé), writer Gail Cameron (Stephanie Faulkner), pro tennis player Jonathan Lane (Mark Sivertsen), adulterous playboy Richard Hamilton (William Shockley), historian Professor Dawson (Nigel Triffitt), Scandinavian actress Anna Benson (Mary Stavin) and ponytail-sporting Aussie Ray Price (Clive Turner, who also produced and wrote the script). Quite a varied group, but each turn out to be connected in some way they don't yet realize and all happen to share the same odd birthmark on their arm. Oh yes, and one just so happens to be a werewolf. The Count has lured them all there to find out just who it is and to finally put an end to the curse once and for all.Part V isn't at all like the previous four films. In fact, this is one bizarre series in general. The first is a vastly entertaining, in-joke- filled horror film with a sense of humor that helped put director Joe Dante on the map and was an entirely American production. The second is a misbegotten attempt at camp barely linked to the first film, which had UK backing and was filmed mostly in Prague. The third is a truly bizarre kitchen sink horror-comedy-social commentary that was an Australian production (with marsupial werewolves). Part IV was a serious and dull virtual remake of the first movie minus the professionalism and humor that was filmed in South Africa. And this one, which has clearly been influenced most by "Ten Little Indians," had UK, US and Hungarian backing and was filmed in Budapest. If you're keeping score, that's five different movies filmed in five different countries that seldom even relate to one another. None of the sequels come anywhere near the original film and this is no exception to that rule, but it's somewhat better than most of the other sequels.One of the things I liked best about this was the Gothic setting, which is quite unusual for a werewolf tale. There are secret passageways and an endless labyrinth of catacombs underneath the castle for the action to play out in and the art direction and sets are fairly good in this low-budget film. It's also set during a bad blizzard that traps all of the characters inside the castle, so the snowy atmosphere was a nice change of pace, as well. That said, every other component to this film was highly uneven. The cast was a mixed bag of competent actors (Davis, Catlin) and embarrassing amateurs (Shé being the worst offender there, though several of the male cast members give her a run for her money). The dialogue is frequently laughable and the whole mystery plot (possibly influenced by the earlier THE BEAST MUST DIE [1974]) also isn't anything to write home about. The filmmakers employ at least one 'cheat' scene to conceal the identity of the wolf, which isn't revealed until the very end.Perhaps the most disappointing thing of all is that this film is sorely lacking in werewolf scenes. You rent a werewolf movie to see werewolves, am I right? Well here we never once get a full view of one of the creature. It is almost always shown in silhouette or in shots too dark to make out and the werewolf's face is only shown two times that I recall, with both shots little more than brief flashes. Needless to say, that also means there are no man-to-wolf transformation scenes that the series bases hinges its reputation on and that all four previous films contain. Don't expect any blood, gore or on-screen deaths either. All of the victims either just react to an approaching werewolf or get pulled off-screen to die. If not for two instances of female nudity, this probably would have received a PG-13 rating.

Basically this is the werewolf version of Ten Little Indians. A group of people end up stranded at a castle during a snowstorm and while they wait for it to end someone or something begins to pick them off one by one. With the howling and teeth marks on the bodies it points to one of them not being what they seem. This is actually a fairly descent Howling movie but it does have a small budget. I will give credit in the fact that they did well with what they had. The ending is also somewhat clever if you are not paying close attention throughout the movie. Overall not bad for what it is and is better than some of the other sequels.