Brian's B Movies - Reviews and Suggested Suffering - Moon of the Wolf

Guy or girl, it makes no difference when it comes to social expectations for personal hygiene in the workplace.  If you are expected to shave your face or legs as part of your professional appearance then you better show up clean and smooth.  So how can you make up for it?  Straight razor while blindfolded?  No way!  It’s not like you tore a rift in time and space; that’s Dr. Who’s job.  No, you need to suffer a little to know better next time, so get some popcorn and settle in for a good lashing of your higher brain functions.  If you are going to work looking like a werewolf, then you might as well learn something from one.

Moon of the Wolf (MOW) made for T.V. in 1972 was directed by Daniel Petrie and starred the amazing David Janssen, (star of the original fugitive, and yes the movie with Harrison Ford was a remake kids) a T.V. superstar from the days of black and white right up to the ‘80s.  He plays the local sheriff Aaron Whitaker who discovers the slain body of a young local girl in a small Louisiana town.  Initial findings make the locals leap to the conclusion the poor girl was attacked by wild dogs, and some go even so far as to think it might be the work of wolves.  The local doctor, the only one it seems even though they have a hospital, knows that she was struck on the side of the head with incredible power by a left handed person.  Aaron knows he has his work cut out for him in finding just one suspect because almost everyone we meet in the town is creepy enough to be a person of interest due to motive or their suspect placement on the evolutionary scale.  Everyone seems to have a background or story needing closer scrutiny.

There is the obligatory rich family complete with obnoxious heir to the family fortune.  His estranged sister Louise, who has suddenly returned from the bright lights of New York City apparently against her will.  A plethora of other creepy back woods hillbillies complete with a mad old man who screams out werewolf in French in a delirious state.  It took almost the entire movie for Louise to pop in to translate for Aaron which is odd they only have two people in a small Louisiana town that understand fractured French.  But these are minor flaws in the grand scheme of this movie.  The special effects are the true stars of this film.

This is where the lack of shaving comes in.  Among other little failed attempts at momentarily suspending disbelief like the linebacker with a wig portraying Louise running form the dog man, or paper like quality of the mansion doors our monster smashes through there is the poor excuse for a monster. The wolf man looks like a guy who didn’t shave very well and has some unruly eyebrows to contend with.  His hands look like he’s been cleaning the drains at the local YMCA after a male pattern baldness convention.  Is all of this movie magic frightening?  You’ll have to be the judge on this one, but if you are easily startled by things that do nothing whatsoever in the dark you might want to keep a light on after you go to bed.  Remember, this was the “70s and Columbo was considered suspense at the time.  But one thing is for sure.  Simply on the off chance that anyone having seen this film will be reminded of it by your forgetting to shave is enough to make sure it never happens again.  Check it out.