Lycanthropus - El terror de los lobos

This early Italian horror mixes the werewolf horror film with a mystery story. Set is a reform school for wayward girls, there's a series of murders - could it be a werewolf? What do you reckon? It has a few pacing problems but it has some good sequences to make up for that. While its goofy title is a little misleading, as this one plays its horror fairly straight.

Mystery ... intrigue ... actresses sounding like they're having an orgasm while being attacked by a monster ... this was what good film-making was all about in the fifties and sixties. Lycanthropus has all of this and more.

After murders begin to occur at a reformatory school, the students and indeed some of the teachers begin to suspect (rather randomly) that a werewolf is responsible. It quickly becomes a mystery to discover who the werewolf is, with several red herrings thrown in before the real killer is revealed to the audience.

This movie is notable as being probably the first Italian werewolf movie ever made. It was released as "Werewolf in a Girl's Dormitory" in the US with the usual crappy dubbing, which is always good. The over-acting on screen coupled with the vocal over-acting will mean plenty of entertainment for fans of those awful old B-movies. However, aside from a couple of key scenes, it's not quite bad enough to be good. The guy who plays the creepy janitor reminded me a lot of Peter Lorre, so his performance was quite enjoyable, but basically there's not enough content here to fill the entire ninety minutes. There are large segments which are just plain dull.

It's pretty much an average B-movie, good for collectors and genre fans.

This is, as you might expect, a movie about a werewolf in a girl's dormitory (although technically the werewolf mostly hangs around in a forest outside the girl's dormitory). The "girls" actually look to be about twenty-five on average and resemble European fashion models of the era much more than the "delinquents" they're supposed to be. And this was made in 1962 so you're not going to get any nighties or plaid mini-skirts, let alone any nude shower scenes. Still this is an entertaining little movie that serves to show the potential "beast" that lurks within the heart of all respectable men when they get around nubile young women. The first murder especially, while tame by today's standards, was no doubt quite a taboo-breaker at the time. The werewolf attacks his victim "missionary style" and the screams and cries that she makes as he ravages her off-screen could easily be taken for something else entirely. The other murders and attacks are less lurid, but generally pretty effective.

The movie also provides a plethora of great suspects and red herrings including a new professor who left his old job after a mysterious scandal, a benefactor of the school who is paying various girls for sexual favors (and finds himself being blackmailed), the creepy and very bestial-looking groundskeeper, and the very refined headmaster who nevertheless bears a striking resemblance to the werewolf. The movie really keeps you guessing to the end.

It's in black-and-white, of course, and it's dubbed (although the European cast does seem to be speaking English most of the time). Not a great movie perhaps, but not a bad way to waste 80 minutes either.

There is something bleak and disjointed about this film. First of all, I appreciate the fact that it has an interesting story and a few obstacles thrown in the viewers path. The movie is as much psychological as it is horrific. I don't like slasher movies and am bored with them, especially the ones out of the era where this movie appeared. It turned out to be kind of an atmospheric werewolf movie. It's deliberately misleading at times. Characters are there for no other reason than to confuse us. But it plays by the rules. The main female figure is quite pretty. The rest of the girls seem rather the same and there's a stuffy restraint all around. Nevertheless, there are some attacks, pretty good special effects, and an interesting conclusion.

Werewolf in a Girl's Dormitory was scripted by Ernesto Gastaldi, and anyone who knows that name won't be surprised to find out that despite being a werewolf film, this is also a clear precursor to the entire Giallo sub-genre. The film features themes that would go on to become the staple of the Giallo; including a setting full of attractive young girls, and an unknown killer who is picking them off. It has to be said that this film was ahead of it's time, and as the title suggests, the killer in this film is a werewolf, and it would seem that the main inspiration for the scriptwriter was the Universal classic 'The Wolf Man', although themes from more wayward titles such as 'Psycho' definitely shine through. The plot focuses on a dormitory for tearaway girls. When one of them is murdered, apparently by a werewolf, suspicion falls on the new science teacher at the school. Naturally, the crime is attributed to some wolf-like creature, and when the murders continue; the detective on the case ends up getting a surprise!

The film is shot in black and white, and looks very cheap throughout. This is certainly a reflection on the budget restraints, although they don't harm it too much as the mystery plot is often enough to pull it through. The scriptwriter would certainly improve as his career went on; with his collaborations with ace director Sergio Martino representing his best work. As you might expect, there isn't a great deal of violence and murder in the film; a reflection on the time the film was made, although this doesn't hurt the film too much as a plot like this doesn't always need blood and guts to succeed. The cast doesn't shine too much, and it's not hard to see why many of them didn't go on to receive cult status, although Carl Schell does stand out; mostly because he looks a bit like Peter Lorre. The conclusion to the story doesn't contain much in the way of surprise, as it's always obvious what the murderer is; although the way that the ending plays out is good in that it inspires some thinking. Overall, while this isn't a particularly good film; it deserves extra plaudits for its influence and frankly bizarre plot, and is definitely worth seeing for Italian horror aficionados!