For tonight’s movie, I’m hitting the Werewolf sub-genre again and finally checking out Hammer Horror’s take on the beast from 1961. This is from legendary director Terence Fisher and stars legendary actor Oliver Reed (In his first lead role). It also features a 12 tone serials score from Benjamin Frankel. That is, the score avoids being in any key by ensuring that every note in the chromatic scale is played the same amount. Arthur Grant provides cinematography and Anthony Hinds (Credited as John Elder) wrote the screenplay.
In 18th-century Spain a beggar is imprisoned by a cruel marques and left for years forgotten in his dungeon. For years he is seen only by a mute serving girl that sends him his food. Over time he becomes a feral beast in that dungeon. After the serving girl is put into the same cell for refusing the marques advances, she is raped by the feral beggar. Begging for a freedom she is taken to the marques, but kills him and flees. Later she is found by a kindly gentleman-scholar, who lives alone with his housekeeper. They tend to her but she dies giving birth to the child of the feral beggar. The scholar raises the boy as his own, but it becomes apparent he is cursed.
Origin of the Curse
This really is a film of two halves. Specifically, Oliver Reed is only in the second half. The first half tells of his origin story, explaining why he was born with the curse. This section of the movie drags somewhat and involves a number of characters that are long gone by the time you get to Reed’s section. It’s not that this section is actually bad, it just feels like part of a different story. A lot of the story is setting up the “Marqués Siniestro” as an over the top evil villain. However, he’s dead before Oliver Reed turns up, so feels wasted. He is there to explain how a beggar ended up abandoned in the prison until driven into a feral form. Really, wasn’t neccisary.
The beggar in the dungeon is given it’s prologue, showing why the Beggar is in the dungeon. It’s not much of a reason either and amounts to the Marqués being a dick. But this too is given a prologue explaining why the beggar has turned up to this feast to end up in the dungeon. Then this entire section exists as a prologue to showing the child version of Reed’s character and revealing that he has the curse. It’s a very long winded origin story. Which would be fine if there was a lot to the main story, but by this point we’ve only got 45 minutes left. So the second half ends up feeling rushed.
Classic Werewolf Tragedy
Despite having three very distinct and isolated acts, these are individually very well put together. The acting is all good and the individual stories are relatively compelling. The downside is they are all too short. It’s the screenplay that is the problem here, this was Hinds first full screenplay and he simply put too much in it. It’s actually the middle act where this drags, because at this stage I realized the entire first act was not going to impact the rest of the film and I just wanted them to hurry up and get to an adult Leon. What I will say though is the child they had play Leon as a child really does look like Oliver Reed. He wasn’t a great actor, so I’m guessing they cast him on looks.
When we finally get to Reed’s section, it’s actually very good. Rushed, but good. Leon is quickly thrown into a relationship with the unobtainable daughter of his new employer. But as fast as it happens, it’s not fast enough to avoid the curse. Having killed an innocent girl, Leon wants to die and goes as far as to ask to be burned to death. Eventually when he changes, escapes and is hunted down it becomes a classic werewolf tragedy. We’ve seen it in the original “Wolf Man” movie, and we’ve seen it done best in “American Werewolf in London”. This is werewolf movie bread and butter. Reed plays a great tragic character. He is doomed from the start and ultimately only wanting to protect others from the beast within.
Conclusion
This is a well directed movie, with great sets, great and original music and quality acting. Unfortunately the plot is hampered by spending so much time in the set up and doing no more than the standard Wolfman thing for it’s final act. It features a great villain and a tragic hero that never actually have anything to do with each other. It’s actually the kind of movie that could work better these days, where they’d just extend it by another 40 minutes, allowing for a lot more meat to the main section. But Hammer Horror movies tended to be around the 90 minute mark and so that wasn’t to be. This is still a solid 6/10 however. Not a must see, but recommended as a solid werewolf movie.
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