In 1981, The Howling and An American Werewolf in London brought werewolves back into the zeitgeist and studios were seeing dollar signs. The Howling was a Joe Dante film that was a enough of a success to land him the gig directing Gremlins. Obviously, The Howling needed a sequel. Enter Australian filmmaker, Philipe Mora. What he made is wildly different from the previous film despite immediately following and referencing the first film.

A clue as to what the viewer is in for is in the subtitle: “Your Sister Is a Werewolf”. Partly filmed in Los Angeles and partly filmed in Czechoslovakia, it was only the third U.S. film to be shot behind the Iron Curtain. The settings are forests and real castles in eastern Europe, but the soundtrack is heavily New Wave and Rock based. Throw in werewolves with an MTV aesthetic and the film has a lot of clashing tones. The werewolf effects are not the best, but the film has a lot of them. It is definitely a quantity over quality situation. There are a lot of stories about the werewolf suits being gorilla suits from Planet of the Apes. Christopher Lee even added a line to help explain that away. “The stages of evolution are reversed. There are many stages between before man becomes beast.” Christopher Lee plays a werewolf hunter who acts like a vampire hunter. He tries to stab a werewolf in its coffin with a silver stake, he stocks holy water as a weapon, and the head werewolf lives in a castle in Transylvania. Also, silver is no longer good enough to kill the oldest and most powerful wolves. Their weakness is titanium. There is also a very random bit that rips off Alien where a gargoyle shoves its tail down a priest’s throat and lays an egg in him. There is a werewolf threesome with no physical touching. Apparently, this was because the hair would get pulled off of the body with the lightest touch. There is also a scene with a werewolf orgy. The movie has a good deal of sexuality in it. Once the story ends, there is a music video composed of shots from the film. During this montage, the clip of Queen of the Werewolves, Sybil Danning, ripping her top of and exposing her breasts is shown seventeen times.

The 4k disc looked great and while the Blu-ray was not as crisp, it still had a good picture. The transfer was from the original 35mm negative. There are multiple commentary tracks including new and archival tracks from the director. The special features also include a bunch of great interviews. There is an interview between two filmmakers, Michael Mohan asking questions to Philippe Mora. Mora shows lots of behind-the-scenes stories and Mohan is clearly enjoying the conversation. There is an interview with Annie McEnroe, who originally was unsure of doing the movie because she wanted something more “respectable”. Despite this, she speaks positively of all her co-workers and said making the film was a blast. Special effects coordinator, Steve Johnson, gives an eleven-minute interview and discusses some big movies he worked on previously, but The Howling 2 was his first as the head of special effects. New to the job as boss and filming in a communist country, Johnson described the shoot as stressful and disorganized. Wife and artistic consultant to the director, Pamela Krause gives an eleven-minute interview where she does a lot of name-dropping. For example, she met her husband at a Salvador Dali dinner party. She procured the Frank Llyod Wright’s Hollyhock House as a shooting location. There is a fifteen-minute interview with Stephen Parsons, composer and former rock musician. Originally, he was asked to do a theme song for the movie but when the director heard it, he asked Parsons to compose for the entire movie. Parsons infused the soundtrack with electric guitars and synthesizers and the entire thing performed with only three musicians. Parsons also performed as the lead singer of the band during the club scene. The audience was filled with actual youth from Prague who were starved for American culture. Jonathan Rigby has a 25-minute featurette about Christopher Lee and brings up that using the metric of screen-time, The Howling 2 is one of his more substantial roles. From the archives, Sybil Danning gives a sixteen-minute interview. While she was okay with her nudity in the context of the movie, she was furious about the repetitive use of the breast shot during the end credits. Hilariously, she also talks about how unattractive the KGB agent following her was. There’s an archival interview with Reb Brown. Before acting, he worked as a bouncer and in the sheriff’s department. He also trained in multiple martial arts, including jujitsu. Once he got into acting, he enjoyed his role as Captain America because he got to embody a “pure hero”. The final archival interview is with special effects crew, Steve Johnson and Scott Wheeler. Scott mentions having no experience but getting his special effects job due to his enthusiasm. The Steve Johnson segments felt like a re-hash of the other interview in the special features, except for the story about having to paste werewolf hair on a man’s penis while the man belts opera. There is a four-minute gag reel that really does not contain any laughs. An original trailer and a stills gallery round out the special features. The physical case includes some sweet looking artwork and a lengthy booklet. The quality of the release is top-notch.

Is the Howling 2 a good film? The film is kind of a mess. Clashing tones, inconsistent effects, and a bizarre storyline would make that a “no”. Yet, some of those traits make it a very fun watch. The entire film-making philosophy can be summed up in this behind-the-scenes exchange. Sybil wanted to know why her character would put on sunglasses in the throne room of a dark castle and the director replied, “Because you’re Queen of the Werewolves. You can do whatever you want!” For me, it’s a recommend.