AWSUM MOVIES: An American Werewolf in London

AWSUM MOVIES: 

In Defence of

An American Werewolf in London

“Well I just watched An American Werewolf in London, 1981. I'd heard of it of course but hadn't ever actually watched it, so I recorded it. I must say a 37 year delay in seeing wasn't worth the wait. Films from the 80's are generally really shite.”

A Lecturer from Portsmouth University.

That was a post on facebook from a retired art lecturer I know. Well I disagree. So much so, that I felt compelled to write this essay and point out why ‘An American Werewolf in London’ was the most awsum movie ever made: a ground breaking film that took almost a decade to realise. Its trademark effects and ingenuity re- invigorated the horror film genre with a new perspective and inspired a whole generation of young film makers, including Michael Jacksons ‘Thriller’ Video. Without its influence you wouldn’t have had ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ or the ‘Underworld’ franchise.

The most iconic and memorable scene was of course the wolf transformation: (which won an academy award) but its easy to forget that there was no CGI way back in 1981 and this effect had to be handled painstakingly by FX artist Rick Baker.  

‘American Werewolf’ is also chock full of interesting and humorous characters, too many to mention here but included the delights of Jenny Agutter, Yorkshire man Brian Glover (playing chess with Rik Mayall of The Young Ones) stand up comedian Griffin Dunne, the Shakespearian John Woodvine, Frank Oz (voice of ‘Yoda’) and even a cameo with ‘The Muppets’. Even Alan Ford (of ‘Lock Stock & Two Smoking Barrels’ fame) appears as a typical cockney taxi driver.

The awsum climax of the film crowns the film perfectly as the werewolf goes on the killer rampage across Piccadilly Circus, achieved by actually closing off the area to traffic. Not an easy task to pull off but a little known fact was that John Landis bribed the London Met to get access to Piccadilly by giving 300 police officers free tickets to see his ‘Blue Brothers’ movie.

But its easy for us decadent internet savvy post-everthing’ist’s to dismiss such a gem as this John Landis cult classic. It was only in the last ten years or so that a box ticking culture emerged that found it difficult to situate this film. Was it a horror film or a comedy? Was it a black comedy? ‘Rolling Stone Magazine’ called it a Jewish ‘Bi-polar Horror Comedy’. Understandable I guess, since director John Landis was Jewish and cut his teeth on making comedies.

But if anything, ‘American Werewolf’ was a tragedy with sprinkles of humour. ‘a naked American man stole my balloons!’ says a school kid, as our hero scrabbles across London back to Jenny Agutter, after a howling night on the town but hardly is this a  black comedy. ‘Shaun of the Dead’ was a black comedy. Whatever. Tomata, Tomato.

In my humble opinion ‘American Werewolf’ just happened to be as equally funny as it was tragic. Much like life itself, it was simply a fun film with tragic consequences, taking a few light hearted digs at the horror genre and the fact that ‘80’s Britain, only had three Tv channels and the cinemas had really crap porno's.