Welcome back to my Dark Corner of this Sick World.
‘This madness and perversity will turn against you’
We’re looking at The Fury of the Wolf Man.
‘You’ll be surprised to know what I think of this’
The 4th film we’ve reviewed starring genre great Paul Naschy
and the 3rd featuring, werewolf Waldemar Daninsky.
The film opens with Waldemar the only survivor of a Tibetan mountaineering expedition.
‘Just awful – that blizzard and all your crew disappearing forever’
The sort of thing you don’t just get over.
‘They’re buried under the snow’
Or maybe you do.
‘Poor dear, how you must have suffered’
Sounds like his crew took the brunt of it, but Waldemar now carries the werewolf curse, having been bitten by a strange creature.
‘It was the Yeti’
It was?
'Very strange.'
Not a werewolf, then?
‘Just be patient'
There are certain tropes that Naschy films tend to feature; the innocent girl
‘So pure, so ingenuous, so young’
Him being chained up...
and the inevitable tragic conclusion.
‘I have to be destroyed – either by another beast or by a woman who loves me enough to kill me using a silver bullet’
Man’s been killed by more women who love him than any other actor.
These are the tent poles around which a Naschy film is based. In this case however, the tent itself is crazy.
‘I fear the worst’
After killing both his wife...
and her lover...
the werewolf is accidentally electrocuted.
Waldemar is brought back by Ilona, his former colleague and mad scientist.
‘His mind is dominated’
who has a simple dream.
‘It’s an attempt by silence to dominate humanity through the absolute control of the brain’
Waldemar escapes…
ripping the throat of innocent student,
attacking a couple who seem to have wandered in from the middle ages.
And scaring this girl so badly...
that she needs a glass of water to recover.
Back in the castle, Michael Myers is hanging around
and he’s not alone.
‘It seems these underground cellar are housed with all kinds of surprises.
’No kidding, there’s the sex-obsessed revolutionaries,
'To work, liberty, freedom!'
the basement people.
‘They’re not normal’
and...
‘Well isn’t this scientific? They’re neither animals nor plants’
Okay...
‘But after the doctor’s preliminary phase, they’ll be authentical mutants, and always will live in darkness’
Even the doctor’s assistants are questioning this one.
‘This can’t scientific! This can’t be scientific’
And just when you thought it couldn’t get weirder.
So what has this got to do with mind control?
‘There’s nothing to explain really’
I strongly disagree.
‘Just be patient’
Also, what’s it got to do with Waldemar, who has played a surprisingly small role and comes across as being bit whipped.
When he returns...
‘Ilona’s not here, '
'only you and I trapped in this awful place,'
'There’s no way to get out’
No way to get out.
‘It’s all hermetically sealed’
Three problems with this, firstly; he just got in, go back the way you came.
‘It’s useless’
Secondly…
Thirdly…
If you can’t get out, you’re just not trying.
Still Waldemar and innocent girl Karin find ways to pass the time.
They also release the basement people…
attack the revolutionaries…
and kill Michael Myers.
Then read Ilona’s diary.
‘He thinks he’s been cursed by a werewolf – I will make a reality out of this’
'He will kill his wife and then commit suicide.'
So what? He wasn’t bitten?
Cos his bite has had quite an effect on his resurrected wife.
Anyway, everybody dies…
except Karin who gets a consolation love interest.
'Look, what a beautiful day it is.'
You didn’t sleep with the werewolf did you?
No why would think that.
‘It’s like entering a territory that’s forbidden’
There are two ways to watch this film; my way – which I’m willing to admit may be flawed –
was to try and understand it.
‘Please don’t take it so seriously’
The other is to sit back, crank up the Pink Floyd and drink until it synchs up.
‘Not even the most fervent imagination could conceive of half of the horrors we have seen.’
Thanks for watching. If you’d like a less insane werewolf story then check-out my new book The Werewolf of Priory Grange.
Available on the Amazon.
Does anyone know if this film makes more sense in the original language, and if so, what the hell is going on?