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ON THIS DAY IN HORROR - August 21st

"AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON" 

released in 1981

Ignoring the warnings of the patrons of "The Slaughtered Lamb" to stay off the moors, American tourists David (David Naughton) and Jack (Griffin Dunne) are attacked by a lycanthrope (aka a werewolf), with only David surviving. David is now cursed to become a werewolf himself on the next full moon, in John Landis' groundbreaking horror-comedy An American Werewolf in London!

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Hiking across the northern Yorkshire moors, American college students David (Naughton) and Jack (Dunne) stop by a remote country pub, "The Slaughtered Lamb", for directions. When Jack mentions the five-pointed star on the wall, the pub-goers stop talking and become hostile. Over the protests of the pub Landlady, David and Jack decide to leave when they are given a last warning from one of the locals (Brian Glover) to "stay on the road, and off the moors", and to "beware the moon". Unfortunately David and Jack become lost in the fog and find themselves on the very moors they were warned to stay off. There, they are attacked a huge dark animal that kills Jack and nearly kills David, until he is saved by the pub-goers (who decided to come after them having heard the "howls" coming off the moors). When David next wakes, he is in a London hospital being cared for Nurse Alex Price (Jenny Agutter) and Dr. J.S. Hirsch (John Woodvine), who explains that he was attacked by "a madman" on the moors, but David denies this claiming they were attacked by an animal. Later, David starts to have vivid nightmares, and is eventually visited by Jack himself, now an undead spirit that cannot move on until the bloodline of the werewolf that killed him has ended - and urges David to end his own life before he himself becomes a werewolf! Convinced his vision of Jack was simply another nightmare, he is discharged from the hospital and is invited to stay at Alex's home while in London (they later begin an affair). Meanwhile, Dr. Hirsch takes a trip to the Slaughtered Lamb to see if what David has told him is true. When asked about the incident, the pub-goers deny any knowledge of David, Jack, or their attacker. But one distraught pub-goer (David Schofield) speaks to Dr. Hirsch outside the pub and says that David should not have been taken away, and that he and everyone else will be in danger when he changes. On the next night of the full moon, David painfully transforms into a werewolf in Alex's apartment and goes on a murderous rampage, waking up naked on the floor of the wolf cage at London Zoo with no memory of what happened. David realizes that Jack was right about everything and that he is responsible for the murders of the night before, and must now find the courage to stop himself from hurting anymore innocent people, especially Alex, with whom he has now fallen in love.

[Jack appears to David in hospital as the undead]
Jack: On the moors, we were attacked by a lycanthrope, a werewolf. I was murdered, an unnatural death, and now I walk the earth in limbo until the werewolf's curse is lifted.
David: [putting his hands over his ears] Shut up!
Jack: The wolf's bloodline must be severed; the last remaining werewolf must be destroyed. It's you, David.

Top:   Tourists David (David Naughton) and Jack (Griffin Dunne) get lost on the moors;

Above:   Jack returns as the undead to warn David he will become a werewolf.

Director John Landis first came up with the story while he worked in Yugoslavia as a production assistant on the film Kelly's Heroes (1970), when one day he was being driven back from the set Landis saw a group of gypsies appeared to be performing rituals on a man being buried so that he would not "rise from the grave." Landis wrote the first draft of An American Werewolf in London in 1969 and shelved it for over a decade, in the meantime making his debut film Schlock (1973) and the successful comedies, The Kentucky Fried Movie (1977), National Lampoon's Animal House (1978) and The Blues Brothers (1980). Landis box office status in Hollywood finally allowed him secure the $10 million budget for An American Werewolf in London (although financiers were unsure about Landis' script, believing it too frightening to be a comedy and too funny to be a horror film). While John Landis was trying to get this film made, Rick Baker became tired of waiting (over eight years) and decided to use what he had been planning for this film on The Howling (1981). Eventually Landis called Baker and told him, "I have the money. Let's make 'American Werewolf'!" to which Baker replied that he was already doing a werewolf picture. Landis started yelling at Baker over the phone. Baker decided to leave The Howling in the hands of his protégé Rob Bottin and would only consult on that film, leaving him free to do this one (apparently Rick Baker's initial decision is something for which John Landis has never forgiven him, and resulted in several disagreements over what the design of the werewolf should be. Baker wanted it to be a two-legged werewolf saying he thought of werewolves as being bipedal. Landis wanted a "four-legged hound from hell").

In it's earliest incarnation, John Landis had wanted Donald Sutherland for his lead, having worked with Sutherland on the set of Kelly's Heroes. With Sutherland unavailable, studio executives hoped John Landis would cast Dan Aykroyd in the role of David and John Belushi as Jack, but Landis refused. Landis instead hired David Naughton, reportedly because Landis had seen him in a television commercial for Dr. Pepper - in fact, during the body casting sessions, the crew danced around David Naughton singing, "I'm a werewolf, you're a werewolf ... wouldn't you like to be a werewolf, too?" in reference to his days as a pitchman for Dr Pepper!  Only four American work permits were requested of the British government for the production: for director John Landis, makeup artist Rick Baker, and actors David Naughton and Griffin Dunne. The first three work permits were granted by the British government without question. But the British office of Actors' Equity questioned the necessity of a work permit for actor Dunne, claiming that there were already plenty of young American actors living in Great Britain who could portray the role of Jack. It was only when Landis threatened to rewrite the script and re-title the movie "An American Werewolf in Paris" that the equity office reconsidered the application and granted Dunne his work permit.

TRIVIA:   David Naughton reported that the hospital bed in the forest scene was the most difficult and painful one. Back then, they used glass contact lenses.

Top:   Nurse Alex Price (Jenny Agutter) and Dr. Hirsch (John Woodvine) take an interest in David's story;

Above:   David starts to have nightmares he will become a monster.

Unlike most motion pictures it was filmed in sequence, with the opening scenes filmed first and the closing sequences filmed last. The opening scene of the movie - also the first scene filmed - depicts friends David (David Naughton) and Jack (Griffin Dunne) on a walking tour of Yorkshire, Northern England, traveling on foot toward the nearest town. Because of the cold and dampness of the location, Dunne's nose was running. While delivering a line of dialogue, Naughton glanced over at Dunne just in time to see Dunne catching and wiping away a stream of snot running from his nose. Naughton laughed at the sight of Dunne's discomfort, making Dunne begin to laugh while responding to Naughton's line of dialogue. Because of the spontaneity of the shot - and because the scene was largely improvised anyway - director John Landis decided to use that imperfect shot in the film's release print. When Jack is killed by the first werewolf, makeup artist Rick Baker told Griffin Dunne to be careful with the wolf's head as it was new and quite delicate. During the first take Griffin rip the foam rubber off the head. Rick was so irritated by this that he considered putting hard teeth in the wolf but instead used the backup head to "beat the crap out of Griffin."

David Naughton said the transformation scene took 6 days to complete, roughly 10 hours a day spent on applying the makeup, 5 hours on set, and 3 hours of makeup removal. Because the makeup took so long to apply and remove, there was only enough time for one setup a day. Rick Baker estimated that only half an hour of footage was shot during the entire week. The snout protrusion was the last shot to be filmed and it did not include Naughton, but an animatronic head. Rick Baker claimed to have been disappointed by the amount of time spent shooting the face changing shot for the transformation after having spent months working on the mechanism. John Landis only required one take lasting about seven seconds with Baker feeling he had wasted his time until seeing the film with an audience that applauded during that one seven second shot. For the later scenes, the woman whom David runs into at the zoo was not told that David Naughton would be nude, but she was told that a man would simply come out and say something - in fact, Naughton spends over forty percent of the movie naked!

[kisses Alex passionately]
David: I'm a werewolf.
Alex: Are you alright?
David: I don't know, I'll let you know the next full moon.

The scene when the werewolf runs riot in Piccadilly Circus was filmed at that busy intersection when police stopped the normal traffic and the public. Everyone took their places, it was filmed with multiple cameras and it was all cleaned up within the half hour. It was the first time in many years that filming had been allowed in Piccadilly Circus, due to lingering resentment over an unannounced smoke bomb which director Michael Winner set off while filming a scene for The Jokers (1967), after which he sped off in a taxi with the film magazine while other members of the crew were arrested; however, John Landis' cordial experience in working with the Chicago police on The Blues Brothers (1980) helped overcome official reluctance to approve the filming, especially as he had completely worked out a plan, using a scale model of the area, whereby traffic would be minimally disrupted. John Landis had a bit of a communication issue on the set with the effects crew. He told them to take the head of Inspector Villiers (played by Don McKillop) and throw it across the hood of a car. They looked at him in puzzlement, and after he picked up the head and threw it himself, they replied, "Oh, you mean the bonnet."

The total duration of composer Elmer Bernstein's original score for the film is a total of seven minutes, much to the surprise of film music aficionados who have wanted for a release of this music for years. The music is more in the vein of transitional orchestral cues in between the prerecorded songs featured throughout the film, to give the film more dramatic weight where needed. Landis fought hard to secure the rights to the Cat Stevens song "Moon Shadow" to use in the film, but because the film dealt with the supernatural, the undead and werewolves, and also because of the graphic (at the time, 1981) violence, Stevens, who had since converted to Islam and had his name changed to Yusef Islam, refused Landis' request. Yusef objected to the themes and subject matter and did not want his song connected in any way to the film. John Landis thought this was hilarious because, as Landis pointed out, "Moon Shadow" , is actually about killing and dismemberment. Landis thought this song was perfect for his movie, but Stevens had other ideas. Additionally, Landis would ensure that every song in the movie have the word "moon" in the title, including; "Blue Moon" (performed by The Marcels), "Moondance" (performed by Van Morrison), and "Bad Moon Rising" (by Creedence Clearwater Revival).

TRIVIA:   John Landis has reported that when he was approving a high-definition transfer of the film for DVD in the mid-2000s, he was taken aback by how gory the film actually was.

Top:   Rick Baker and his effects crew prepare for David's transformation scene;

Above:   Director John Landis oversees the make-up effects.

During a preview of the film the marquee said, "From the Director of Animal House" Because of this, many people in the audience thought they were seeing a comedy. Reportedly, people ran out of the theater when they discovered it was a horror film because they were frightened! Because of this film, makeup and industry technological contributions became recognized by the Academy Awards in 1981. Makeup artist Rick Baker was the first to receive an Oscar in the new category, with An American Werewolf in London - the first of only two werewolf movies to win the Oscar in this category, with Baker winning them both (the second was for The Wolfman in 2010). The movie also left a profound impression on singer Michael Jackson - most especially by the the makeup and special effects - and insisted on hiring the responsible personnel for his planned music video Michael Jackson's Thriller (1983). When John Landis agreed to direct (his first music video), he brought on board his foremost "werewolf" crew including, Robert Paynter (cinematography), Elmer Bernstein ("creepy" music), his wife Deborah Nadoolman (costume design), and Baker (special makeup effects). Although Baker was reluctant to work again with Landis after his experience on An American Werewolf in London, and was unsure about the actors handling the make-up: "They have to sit still in a chair for hours while you work on them. It's uncomfortable - it's not something actors look forward to." But the Thriller music video, like An American Werewolf in London before it, was greatly praised by the critics, especially for the special make-up effects of Rick Baker and his crew, securing his reputation as Hollywood's "the" premier effects artist!

ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE:   89%