A series of grisly murders hits a small Midwestern town, and young paraplegic Marty (Corey Haim) believes it to be the work of a werewolf. He even catches a glimpse of it, shooting it in the eye with a firework rocket. Now all he needs to do is find which townie is having trouble seeing at the moment. Marty’s bratty older sister (Megan Follows) won’t believe him, but ne’er do well Uncle Red (Gary Busey) humours the boy, and has even bought him a motor scooter dubbed the Silver Bullet. Everett McGill (!) plays the creepiest-looking Reverend in cinematic history, Terry O’Quinn is the local sheriff, Lawrence Tierney is a burly bar owner, and Bill Smitrovich plays one of the more short-fused locals. James Gammon turns up early as the first victim.
Here’s a solid Stephen King adaptation that you might’ve missed. Scripted by King himself, I can see why this 1985 werewolf pic from one-and-done film director Daniel Attias isn’t too popular. It’s too violent for kids, too kiddie-oriented in other ways for adults, but adults who are young at heart at least should like this. I liked it, and I think it’s a good film worthy of rediscovery.
I must say that I found the narration a bit twee, and a little “Anne of Green Gables”. Then I realised that Megan Follows’ character was narrating it (but by a different, older actress), and that kinda made sense. Follows, by the way, comes across as a giant beeyatch in this film, but like Haim in this film, I’m in a wheelchair, so perhaps I’m biased? I also can’t deny that the werewolf is ultimately dispatched way too easily at the conclusion.
The film has what one might call a Spielbergian or Joe Dante-esque opening, with the All-American (but broken) family and folksy locals played by a whole host of familiar faces. Lawrence Tierney is perfectly cast as a gruff bartender with a baseball bat called ‘The Peacemaker’. Uh-huh. **** SPOILER WARNING **** Everett McGill is frankly miscast. He later cuts an impressively menacing figure, but is completely wrong for the part to begin with. **** END SPOILER ****
Corey Haim is immediately and immensely empathetic in the lead, but that’s largely because he’s playing “Lucas” in a wheelchair. If you liked him there, you’ll like him here. Gary Busey, meanwhile, has one of his best-ever character parts as his good-hearted, if ne’er do well uncle. When called upon, Busey could easily slip into good guy roles, and he also doubles as the town drunk here, basically. His absolute sincerity and believability goes a long way to selling the film overall. That said, it’s sadly ironic that Busey would allow a disabled child to ride a motor scooter without a helmet or seat belt. Just sayin’, folks.
In some ways it’s kind of an old-fashioned, character-based horror film and it might be a bit slow and twee for some. But don’t let the folksiness fool you, this is one pretty damn violent film, starting with a terribly fake but amusing decapitation. There’s an obvious reason why we only get a few looks at the werewolf FX/makeup designed by the supposedly great Carlo Rambaldi (Oscar winner for “Alien” and “ET”), but it’s still a nice show of restraint from the director nonetheless, especially in the brutal first attack. The transformations are done in slightly cheating ways, but that was also the case in “The Wolf Man” and that’s a classic film. The cinematography and lighting by Armando Nannuzzi is pretty good, especially the lighting. The music score by Jay Chattaway is particularly excellent throughout.
OVERALL SUMMARY
This is a seriously underrated werewolf film that pays more attention to character and place than a lot of other horror films.
