Review of An American Werewolf in London (1981) by A_So_Horror_Fan — 22 May 2015

The film has some very stereotypical aspects to it, the almost arrogant and foolish way that British intelligence is shown almost seems derogatory, as David must submit to foreign policies and beaurocracy. However the images of Londoners is mildly balanced and justified by the asinine shenanigans of David Kessler. The story is a funny and the negatives are minor unless you’ve seen the film like a thousand times and those idiosyncrasies are all that remain to pick at. The story stays with in a classic premise that does not rely on props or gimmicks of the time to find it’s humor which make it an easy film to watch no matter how many decades pass.

The special effects in this film are kick ass and organic. It is some of the best special effects make up work of the era. It kept with the basic concepts and abilities of creature effects , something that I am glad to see come back into fashion in horror. There are a few scenes in this film that really stand out as far as quality of FX. The rotting visuals are kick ass. Gross and gory and good. Plus I think this is the first time that we saw werewolves as massive beasts instead of the upright biped creature known in earlier stuff like “The Wolfman”. No need for a real wolf, the kind popular in today's shows and movies, nor is there any aspects of the standing monstrosity that is so terrifying such as in “The Howling”. This was a truly original design for the era. It made not only werewolves scary as hell beasts with almost no resemblance to man but it also made real wolves a bit more scary as well (for me anyway).