An American Werewolf in London (1981)

Official trailer

An American Werewolf in London is John Landis’s 1981 American-British horror comedy depicting a werewolf attacking two American college students hiking on the Yorkshire moors, with the surviving student later undergoing his own werewolf transformations in London. David Naughton plays David Kessler. Griffin Dunne plays Jack Goodman. Jenny Agutter plays Alex Price. John Woodvine plays Dr. Hirsch. John Landis wrote the screenplay. PolyGram Pictures and Lycanthrope Films produced the film.

Rick Baker’s makeup effects, especially the transformation sequence, won the first Academy Award for Best Makeup, in the category’s first year.

No werewolf film has topped this one for me. It’s funny and nasty in equal measure, and the transformation makes me squirm in a film that’s otherwise having a great time. My reservation is David Naughton, who’s likable enough but gets outshone by his dead friend in every scene they share.

Landis makes the case that horror can carry real comedy without giving up either.

David Kessler’s progressive transformation drives the escalating intensity, while his comic relationship with the dead Jack keeps undercutting the fear and then deepening it. Landis balances the two so they work together, and the film set a template later horror comedies followed. I think he pulls off something most directors wouldn’t even attempt.

The Effects Achievement

Rick Baker’s makeup effects anchor the picture through the practical transformation sequence that won the first Academy Award for Best Makeup. The film runs through technical commitment that previous werewolf productions couldn’t match. Later practical effects work followed its blueprint for years.

The transformation sequence runs long, with none of the cuts or fades that would soften it, so the audience watches the pain happen in real time alongside the fantasy. Later transformation scenes inherited everything from it. I rank it as the finest transformation ever filmed, and it makes me wince.

The Tonal Approach

A tonal approach that integrates real comedy with serious horror content carries the story. This approach develops through balance that conventional genre purity would refuse. That balance gives the picture the tone later horror comedies borrowed.

The Jack Goodman appearances, with David’s dead friend dropping by a little more decomposed each time, are the reason for the film’s reputation. The jokes pile up alongside the dread, and the comedy feeds the horror. Griffin Dunne is my favorite thing in the picture, cheerfully falling apart with each visit, and he makes me laugh and shudder in the same breath.

The Music Approach

The soundtrack leans on ironic use of moon-themed songs including Creedence Clearwater Revival’s ‘Bad Moon Rising’, Van Morrison’s ‘Moondance’, and Sam Cooke’s ‘Blue Moon’. The strategy runs through ironic counterpoint that conventional horror scoring wouldn’t provide. That irony defines the film’s music.

The moon songs are the film’s self-aware wink at werewolf conventions, and the wink never breaks its commitment to the horror. The joke delights me. Putting Van Morrison’s ‘Moondance’ and Sam Cooke’s ‘Blue Moon’ over a werewolf picture is the kind of cheek I wish more horror films had.

Does An American Werewolf in London still hold up?

An 8. Rick Baker’s transformation is still the benchmark, the Jack visits are the best mix of laughs and dread I know, and I find the moon-song joke funny. What keeps it from a 9 is that Naughton’s David is the least interesting person in his own film, and a dead man with a torn throat keeps upstaging him. Watch it for Baker, for Dunne and for Landis’s nerve.

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