An American Werewolf In London - Special Edition [DVD]

I recieved this DVD last weekend and watched it right away. I have not seen this film for years and had forgotten how good it is. I love the englishness of it, David is brilliant and funny and sad as he tries to understand what is happening to him. The music is great and the transformation from man to wolf still looks good. The picture was a little grainy but I did not mind this. It added to the sense of nostalgia! John Landis is a genius!!

One of my all time fave films is finally available on Blu Ray.

I will cut the film review part, I am sure if you are reading this, you know the film and you just want to know the quality.

Picture
Very grainy, think the recent Ghostbusters Blu Ray in terms of the grain. Intrusive at first but once your eyes adjust it feels quite clear. It is lot brighter than the grainy and dark VHS/DVD transfers. You can see a lot more. But you get a lot more grain.

Audio
A new English DTS-HD Lossless Master Audio 5.1 Surround track (48kHz/16-bit) has been produced for 'An American Werewolf in London.' The film has always possessed a rather effective mix for a 1981 horror picture, and it has been upgraded nicely here.

Surround deployment is impressive considering the film's age. The rears are active for the big scare moments, particularly the creepy wolf sound effects, and general atmosphere. Charles Bernstein's underrated score is also nicely balanced, which gives a decent heft to the soundfield. Dialogue is pretty crisp and intelligible, with only some of the hushed tones and British accents a bit muffled. Low bass isn't particularly impactful (the mix sounds a bit brittle, particularly high-end) but it's strong enough to give some kick to the wolf attack scenes. Again, considering the age of the material, I was happy with this mix.

Extras
This is where the film marks high for me. Paul Davis's "Beware The Moon" is a fanboy geekgasm of a documentary, and a feature length one at that. He gathers the thoughts of everyone worth hearing from involved with the film and visits the locations. I didnt want this to end. The rest of the special features bassically mirror the 2001 DVD (Outtakes without sound, casting the hand etc) but "Beware The Moon" makes this Blu Ray worth the purchase.

David Kessler and his best friend Jack Goodman are on summer vacation from college and decide to backpack in Europe, making a start in the cold and damp moors of Northern England; in the middle of what seems like nowhere they stumble upon a tiny village and a pub known as The Slaughtered Lamb where some very peculiar and somewhat aggitated locals are less than enthusiastic about their company. Before they leave, they're warned to "beware the moon" and "keep to the road", both notes of advice they unfortunately ignore.

Soon, a fierce howling begins to pitch the night, and David and his friend Jack are attacked savagely by some kind of wild beast roaming the moors; David awakens in a hospital in London to discover his friend has died from the attack, and he has been there some time. David is suddenly plagued with frightning and vivid dreams; his friend Jack visits him in a decomposing and bloody state telling him that they were attacked by a werewolf, and that David must "break the curse" he was infected with by the attack.

At first, he dismisses this as hallucations, even when his dreams are becoming even more violent as some carnal entity inside struggles to make itself known.

The film itself is considered today to be THE epitome of the werewolf movie genre. An American Werewolf in London paved the way for makeup and special effects in modern horror as we know it; John Landis' gutsy use of bright lighting and lack of cutaway combined with Rick Baker's real-time physical effects and state-of-the-art prosthetic makeup made this film revolutionary for the horror genre so much that the Academy Awards began to celebrate special effects and makeup. Even seeing the magic of digital effects and special effects in modern movies, I still can't help but be impressed when watching the full transformation scene.

While the film is gory and somewhat frightening (although somewhat tame by today's standards), Landis used a somewhat "Hitchcockian" approach to direction of the movie, giving it some "laugh out loud" moments in black comedic style to ease the audience in before the real suspense or terror is due to come along - tactics that are still widely used today by horror directors (Sam Raimi being a good example). While not strictly a comedy in a sense, the movie has a good entertainment value. A MUST for all werewolf fans.