It’s been a while since we’ve done any Creature Features pieces celebrating our favorite monsters and glorious practical effects, and we’re LONG OVERDUE for a Silver Bullet article. Of which none has been done on this website and being the huge fan I am of this film in particular and this month marks the 35th anniversary of its release, I better get my ass in gear before my Tarker’s Mills card is revoked.
When I say I’m a fan, there’s my commitment status. I don’t fuck around like a virgin on prom night.
Anyway, let’s start with the obvious. I understand a lot of people disregard the Reverend Werewolf’s final reveal look; comparing it to something of a dog-bear, (and honestly, you aren’t wrong about that). However, it is meant as an insult rather than a critique, and I think a lot of these people have An American Werewolf on London on the brain. I will argue till the day I die that THIS look, (not transformation but LOOK) in particular, is far scarier and that is my personal, and firm opinion on the matter.
And I will fucking die on that hill.
Special effects master Carlo Rambaldi, whose notable works include creating the works behind King Kong (1976), Alien, and E.T. The Extra Terrestrial, was tasked as the special and make-up effects head to complete the werewolf looks in Stephen King’s novella turned featured film. The realistic style suit was one piece that was topped with a mask that was operated by a variety of mechanics operated by the crew. Twelve levers to be exact, like that of a bicycle, that could manipulate the wolf’s facial expressions. For long-distance shots, there was a simpler mask that didn’t require all the fancy, tech wires.
However, Rambaldi was only given five executive weeks to pull of this sorcery. Hey, if the master of Queen Alien could do it, anyone can! Still, shooting had commenced even before the final suit and mask were ready. So those little snips of the werewolf, leading up to the big reveal, were done with another purpose behind them.
“Ultimately, it looked like a bear,” confesses Attias. “The werewolf was very late in being designed, and Carlo (Rambaldi) was given very little time or money to work on it. In fact, it was so late that we had already started filming before we had the suit, so we started shooting scenes without it. I tried to make sure the audience would see it as little as possible. – Excerpt from interview with the Master Cylinder.
Everett McGill wore the suit for most of the shooting and spent a considerable amount of time figuring out the perfect walk for something that was neither man nor beast. But a man that has been trapped inside an animal, who eventually accepted his fate and embraced this dark shadow within him. Resulting in the werewolf quenching his thirst for blood on the “sinners” of the town- as McGill puts it speaking to the Shadow Nation podcast. However, he wasn’t even the first choice! Attias had hired a dancer to wear the suit, but apparently, it didn’t work out, resulting in McGill going hairy balls deep in the role-playing of both the wolf and his not-so-holy counterpart. More demanding stunts in the costume required a double; which was taken on by Julius Le Flore, the stunt coordinator for the film.
Now. We certainly can’t talk about the effects without mentioning the greatest scene in the movie that brought together a record FORTY werewolves on screen together; the most in any film to date. In lieu of Rambaldi, make-up artist Michael McCracken, Jr. was in charge of the dream sequence that involved a few actors already in the film, and the rest were made up of Julius Le Flore’s friends of gymnasts and dancers. Clearly distinguishing themselves as different from Lowe’s wolf persona, but were taught the “werewolf walk” McGill had been practicing by the good ol’ Reverend himself.
The congregation of wolves was broken down into three groups. One group had radio transmitting facial features providing movement in the ears, forehead, and mouth. The second bunch had a “tongue device”; allowing the performing to snarl by simply moving the device around with, well, their tongue. The third had no special effects at all other than make-up and served as the background werewolves.
And since it’s such a wonderful sequence, let’s give it a watch.
To say the least, there were a lot of painstaking elements involved in the production of these creatures. And while some may mock Rambaldi’s werewolf concept, including that of Producer Dino De Laurentiis, it was the only one that gave me nightmares when I was a kid. That has to account for something!
Nightmare Nostalgia 