Tomb of the Werewolf

Tomb of the Werewolf (2003) is a terrible movie. But it has some spots that keep it from receiving a place in the dust-bin. Another straight-to-video flick from Fred Olen Ray who's aided and abetted by ancient Iberian lycanthrope Paul Naschy (Jacinto Molina). A boring rehash of the old werewolf genre except it's filled with some sleaze and girl-on-girl action. But the scenes are either boring or too tame to be of interest. Over the years some filmmakers improve but unfortunately F.O.R. has still remained a z-grade director. But he's a genius compared to clowns such as David De Coteau and his fifty other alias.

Not recommended unless you want to watch tame R-rated soft-core porn, uninspired directing, bad acting, inane writing and cheesy special effects.

WARNING! Do not be fooled by the fancy graphics on the DVD cover. It's a trap! Put this movie back on the shelf immediately! Proceed to the nearest bathroom, and wash your hands with a combination of gasoline and steel wool.

This steaming pile is nothing more than a porn producer's attempt at making a horror movie. Think of Tomb of the Werewolf as a porno with "actors" wearing Halloween masks bought from their local hardware store. This production company should be hanged with a latex werewolf dildo, toot sweet!

Note: I think there should be a federal law put into place. DVD covers should represent the actual content of their movies. The cover on this DVD is a case of pure fraud!

A man who recently inherited a European castle with a rumored hidden treasure invites the buxom crew from a television supernatural show to help him find the treasure. I said buxom crew, because, I believe, that is the whole point of this film. After pre-title sequence where our buxom villainies offers a buxom victim to a strangely-annoyed Lucifer, who appears via a bad special effect, we skip ahead a couple hundred years to the present day where the buxom host of the television show starts getting naked on the sofa with her producer boyfriend, and then…. Wait a minute. Was I hitting on a subtle leitmotif? I decided to hit pause button and went to the trusty IMDb to see whether I was watching a horror movie or soft core porn. I was right to suspect the latter. It seems director Fred Olen Ray has done quite a bit of soft core. Oh well. Nothing wrong with that, unless you were hoping to see a horror movie and there wasn't any thing scary here unless you have an unnatural fear of breasts. Ray, however, is a true professional and he moves things along at a brisk pace, so it really doesn't matter too much if the level of acting fails to rise above that of soft core porn or if the 'action' music theme sounds like a refugee from a mid-90's video game. No thrills or scares here, but if you like breasts….

Tomb Of The Werewolf was more like a college porno film, within the first ten minute there is already a woman feeling up another girl, now that's not the bad part. The bad part was, is that the movie was terribly done, bad actors, not a bad plot but the way they made Paul Naschy become a werewolf was ridiculous. I mean come on, a silver cross can only kill the werewolf? He looked more like a guy who hadn't shaved in a while much less than a werewolf. But if you are a person who likes movies with a terrible plot, horrific actors, awful special effects and it has the makings of a bad college porn flick, then you will certainly love Tomb Of The Werewolf.

Tomb of the Werewolf (2004)

** (out of 4)

Paul Naschy made his twelfth and final appearance as Waldemar Daninsky in this American production that was quickly thrown together when the Spanish legend came to the States for a quick visit. The film centers on the Daninsky Castle where there's a hidden treasure somewhere. The last relative of Waldemar invites a reality show there to try and find it but an evil servant (Michelle Bauer) decides to bring Waldemar, the werewolf, back to life. Okay, if you're expecting the Waldemar of two decades ago then you're going to be disappointed but at the same time I think this film offers enough for fans of Naschy who aren't going to be offended by what the movie is. There's no question that this film doesn't work but I think some of being overly harsh on it because it doesn't look, feel or smell like the films Naschy was making earlier in his career. This film contains a lot of nudity, various sex scenes and a weak story but at the same time I think the werewolf side of things gets plenty of attention and we get to see Naschy, in full make up, attacking more people here than in any of the other films that this character appears in. The transformation scenes, done through cheap CGI, are extremely bad so thankfully we only have to see them a couple times whereas the wolf just appears in the other scenes. I think Naschy is good at his old tricks of howling, jumping out and biting folks but the screenplay never gives him any dialogue with the make up. I understand how this might upset fans but again, we have to remember how quickly this thing was thrown together. I found the rest of the cast to be entertaining even if they weren't giving the greatest performances out there. Bauer is fine as the vamp with Stephanie Bentley, Danielle Petty and Jacy Andrews turning in fun characters as well. There's plenty of bloody attacks to keep horror fans entertained and plenty of nudity for the teenage boy in all of us. Ray hasn't created any masterpiece or anything ground breaking but I think fans of Naschy should at least check it out to see the man in his most famous role one last time.