THE WOLF MAN (1941)

Country: U.S.A.

Genre(s): Horror

Director: George Waggner

Cast: Lon Chaney Jr. / Claude Rains / Ralph Bellamy

Plot

Larry Talbot returns to his ancestral home only to be attacked by a werewolf and therefore cursed to become one himself.  While others investigate the series of murders he leaves in his wake, Talbot tries to find a cure and save his loved ones from becoming his victims.

What I Liked

While “The Wolf Man” isn't at all frightening for a modern viewer, there is nonetheless an intriguing darkness to the visuals of the film.  The filmmakers make interesting use of shadows, having them cross through a frame at strange angles that chop the frame into obvious black and white partitions.  This effect appears most obviously in the interior scenes and scenes shot in the village.  The consistency must mean it was intentional, perhaps as a reflection of the “duality of man” theme that runs throughout the script.  The technique predates similar uses of shadow in the film noir genre that was still a few years down the road in 1941.

Also worth mentioning is the performance of Claude Rains in the role of Talbot's father.  While melodramatic overacting pervades much of the film, Rains' performance is low-key and much more realistic.  In my opinion his naturalism dominated the scenes he shared with the other actors and their more ham-fisted performances.

What I Didn't Like

As mentioned above, the acting through most of the film was over the top to the point of laughable.  Characters react to simply eerie or mildly disturbing events with sheer panic.  This doesn't make the scenes more frightening, only unbelievable and farcical.  Ultimately this leaves the movie feeling dated and at times goofy.

Most Memorable Scene

Outdoing even Claude Rains' performance, make-up artist Jack Pierce is the real source of this film's success.  Lon Chaney Jr.'s appearance when he is in full werewolf regalia proved so impressive it remains definitive seven decades later.  So the key scene here is of course the key scene in so many werewolf movies: the transformation.  Here the efforts of Pierce, Chaney, and director George Waggner come together to effect the very first on-screen transformation from man to werewolf.  We see only Chaney's feet as they slowly morph into bestial appendages, complete with hair and claws.  We then immediately cut to those wolf-like legs in action as the monster stalks the woods in search of his prey.  By today's standards, the change may seem pretty hokey but it was groundbreaking for its time and the biggest payoff (more so than the plot's intended climax) for the viewing audience.

My Rating: 3 out of 5