Howling 4: The Original Nightmare

Ah... the Original Nightmare?

Stats
FOUND AT: Big Lots.
PRICE: $5.99 US
DIRECTOR: John Hough (not John Hughes)
SCREENPLAY: Freddie Rowe and Clive Turner
STARRING: Romy Windsor, Michael T. Weiss, and Susanne Severeid.
YEAR: 1988
RATING: R for melting Jarod and some poor nudity.
AVAILABILITY: Yes indeedy! (VHS only, and only used from Amazon.com, fortunately)
IMDB FUN FACT!:
Theme song: "SOMETHING EVIL, SOMETHING DANGEROUS"
Vocals and Lyrics by Justin Hayward, of the Moody Blues!
Music by Barrie Guard, whom I'm not sure even exists.
HILARIOUS REVIEW:
(From Amazon.com)
" howling4, July 19, 1999

cany i bay tis video on wh --This text refers to the VHS Tape edition."

(Due to a lack of equipment and the fact that making screen captures of this piece of crap is just a waste of time, drawings by me have been used in place of real images from the movie.)

I found Howling IV: The Original Nightmare in a Big Lots for $5.99 (I overpaid, I know). I was sure it would suck, since it fit some of my criteria for crappy movies:

1. it's a horror movie
2. it's a sequel
3. it's a sequel to a movie I'd never heard of
4. it's filled with actors I've never heard of (with the exception of Michael T. Weiss, of TV's "The Pretender")
5. it contains the word "erotic" in the description (twice!)
6. it went straight to video

So I chose it over The First Power, starring Lou Diamond Phillips, of TV's "Wolf Lake" (heh). One look at back cover of the Howling IV box made me think it was a remake of "Michael Jackson's Thriller," which only gave me false hope that Vincent Price was in it. Sadly, it turned out to be worse than any three hour Michael Jackson music video.

Who's bad!

The film starts off with the credits. The song that plays during the credits screams 1980s, and is extremely inappropriate for the movie.

The main character, Marie, played by Romy Windsor, of TV's "Murder One," is a writer (of mystery books, according to the box. The movie isn't very clear about it) who can't distinct fiction from reality. She hallucinates seeing a nun that looks suspiciously like Igor from "Young Frankenstein," and a werewolf in a barbecue pit. Her boyfriend, Richard, played by the aforementioned Michael T. Weiss, decides that the best thing to clear her mind is taking her to Wilderness Cottage, a house in the middle of a forest, which is near a mysterious, quiet small town named Drakho in California (oddly enough, the movie was filmed in South Africa, so it doesn't look a damn thing like California). Weiss plays Richard either like he's doing a Sylvester Stallone impression (he forgets to do his impression frequently, leaving us with Jarod trying to assume the role of whatever stereotype Richard's supposed to be), or drunk. Either way, he's still got a mullet, as does Marie, making her look like vaguely like Nadine from "What's Happening Now!"

Which is the real Darth Vader?

Marie and her dog Pierre are driven to the cottage by her Aussie co-worker (and probably the man she's cheating on Richard with) Tom, played by Anthony Hamilton, last seen in Fatal Instinct. No, not that Sharon Stone movie, that's Basic Instinct. From the right angle, Tom looks like Robert Redford, the handsomest old guy in Hollywood (take THAT, Donnie Sutherland!). On the way to the cottage, they get directions from the Drakho's Sheriff, who looks like David Koechner of "Saturday Night Live" and acts like the T-1000. The way he talks, which is very grim, ending every sentence with "...", which isn't very effective when you have a southern accent, gives us our first indication that the town is not quite what it seems...

Sister Igor plays the fool. I just realized I drew her without hands...

Later, after meeting Richard in the cottage, they head to town to buy supplies. There they meet Elenor, a shopkeeper and foul temptress. She's not very convincing as a foul temptress, since her voice cracks constantly. After they leave her store, we all know that she's going to seduce Richard. And that she's not what she seems...

Michael T. Weiss is mesmerized as Downtown Julie Brown interviews him about the lackluster sales on his album, "Centre House Rock with Mikey T," an attempt at starting a music career.

Afterward, Marie hears howling at night (during sex with Richard, so it was probably him) and has a prophetic dream that isn't worth describing, other than it involves Marie running slowly, but not in a bright red swimsuit on a beach.

The next day, she is seen wearing the worst outfit on the planet: a see-through lace skirt with denim in the crotch and hip area, with a thicker lace shirt. After her dog runs away, and having the same experience as in her dream in which she runs up to Elenor, who is for some reason walking through the woods at a leisurely pace wearing a cloak. Then Maria finds the decapitated head of her dog. Wow, who didn't see that coming?

So far there's only been one killing, of two hitchhikers that Marie gave some medical attention to, having convienently studied medicine very briefly. The murder scene involves the two running though a shallow pond, falling down, and screaming. It appeared that the camera man stumbled a bit while he was following them through the pond.

After being greeted by the ghosts of the house's former owners, which doesn't startle her in any way, Marie meets Janice, a former nun (and friend of Sister Igor) looking for THE TRUTH. So then they go investigate the town to see what the townspeople are trying to cover up.

Some time later, Marie has another hallucination, in which all the furniture in the cottage just falls over. It's more laughable than haunting, reminding me of kids pretending they'd been shot and falling down while playing Cowboys and Indians or somesuch game. Richard then returns from his frequent trips to Los Angeles (It's not explained what he's doing, nor does it really matter) with a dead animal and a rifle. Then he teaches Marie how to use it. That's right, a woman who's going nuts is taught how to use a deadly weapon. This isn't his only moment of genius: aside from taking her to a house in the middle of nowhere, he leaves her alone in the house at night, so he can buy some more supplies, get drunk, and bang Elenor, who looks like Downtown Julie Brown spliced with Eartha Kitt, without the charm nor the sex appeal. At the same time, Marie sees a wolf outside her house and shoots at it. Elenor screams as the shot is fired.

After more investigation with Janice: Holy P.I., Marie finally tells Richard that she believes that werewolves are rampant in the area. Richard gets angry and leaves. In the middle of the woods, he meets Elenor, and they begin to have sex right in the middle of the woods. Couldn't they wait until they get to a hammock or something? Anyway, she turns into a werewolf. It was a fast transformation: a camera cut to Richard and then back to her as a werewolf. Once she bites him on the shoulder, he returns home. Marie's treatment for his gigantic bloody wound: put a towel over it. That's it.

Later, the wound miraculously heals and he goes out. He runs into Tom, who ends up getting killed by a werewolf seconds later.

What follows is another laughable scene in which Richard melts, which looks more like someone spilled yogurt and semen over his head while a vampire, a zombie, and something unidentifyable all watch joyfully, while chanting something about Satan. He eventually reforms himself into a wolf.

Words cannot do this picture justice.

Meanwhile, Janice and Marie enter the belltower in town, the key to destroying the werewolves once and for all. They run into the Doctor (who, in a previous scene, gave Marie a refill of her Valium subscription) inside, who's surrounded by candles. He starts to transform into a werewolf, ripping part of his face off at the beginning of it for no apparent reason.

Let's skip the specifics of how all the wolves (consisting of all the townsfolk) are killed inside the belltower and say that it involves setting the place on fire while Janice rings the bell to attract them. This leaves Marie staring at Richard's sort of charred corpse and calling his name, followed by a fiery wolf flying at Marie, and that's it. The damn thing's over. After the final scene comes the credits along with the best part of the movie: the theme song. Something eeeviilll.... something dangerouuusssss!

After hitting the rewind button, I realized that this piece of crap is going to collect dust on my shelf, where something worth owning could be. Like that copy of Mr. T's "Be Somebody, or Be Somebody's Fool" I missed out on at a swap meet one humid Sunday. Oh, "Be Somebody, or Be Somebody's Fool," where art thou?

Normal Movie Grade:
Crap Movie Grade:

So crappy, you'll wish you were watching the entire "Smooth Criminal" video. In Swahilli.

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