Aullidos 2: Stirba, la mujer lobo

It doesn´t really bear the thought, but no, this isn´t one of the worst films of all time. Yes, it´s full-blown 80´s trash. Christopher Lee looks mortified, Sybil Danning in big puffy hair shoots lasers (?) from her finger tips, werewolves nuzzle air in their in human form (?), there´s messy SFX effects etc etc.

It´s also mercifully free from the mucky digital hell of horror which passes entertainment for nowadays. There´s candlelit churches, graveyards, dangerous forests, Transylvanian (actually Czech) scenery, and the castle of the werewolf queen, which summarizes the film´s visual style. Both tacky and grand in equal measure, Stirba's bedroom has sumptuous velvet drapes and candles, which clash not too subtly together with cheaply garish red sheets and ridiculous (albeit mercifully tame) werewolf orgy. Nothing to do with short novel Howling II by Gary Brandner - another trashy but entertaining effort - and dismissed by pretty much everybody, Brandner included.

I watched two Christopher Lee movies this weekend, Horror Hotel (Lee at his best) and Howling II (Lee at his worst). This is definitely the low point of the man's career. You can tell he did not want to be here and I feel so sorry for him. The "film" is pretty bad...but it's funny at the same time. I almost peed in my pants when Reb Brown (Captain America himself) ran into the room and screamed "BOO!!" The man is a comic genius and it's laugh out loud funny. Equally funny are the exploding dwarf, the drunken werewolf orgy, and the use of the eighties swipe (that device used to cut from scene to scene). We get some of the corniest swipes ever; a fan, diamond, swirl, and just the classic swipe are all used. Perhaps the funniest thing comes in the credits. The scene where Sybil Danning strips her clothes off is shown 10, count em, 10 times again over the credits. This does not compensate for the crappiness of the movie though. The most unbearable quality about the flick is the lighting. You can't see anything. If there is any werewolf action going on here, you can't see it! It's so dark and sometimes very painful to watch. Howling II is worth watching only if you're a Reb Brown fan or if you want to see Christopher Lee wearing some ridiculously cool eighties sunglasses, or maybe to see some Frankie Goes To Hollywood-lookin' band sing a song about "the pale, pale light of the moonglow."

A man investigating the death of his sister, discovers she is a werewolf and part of a werewolf cult in Transylvanina. The make-up, effects, plot, acting, direction, etc. are either pretty much non-existent or down right silly, but the film is entertaining in a cheesy way and Danning rips off her clothes (again). Bonus at the end credits, that scene with Danning is repeated over and over again. 5 out of 10.

Incredibly idiotic, senseless, and utterly sleazy sequel to the popular 1981 werewolf film "The Howling" stars Sir Christopher Lee as Stefan Crosscoe, an occult expert determined to wipe out lycanthropes, in particular those who associate with the fiendish queen werewolf bitch Stirba (Sybil Danning). He makes a point of telling Ben White (Reb Brown), the brother of the Dee Wallace character from the first film, the specifics of her "death". When Ben is unable to deny the evidence, he heads off, with reporter Jenny Templeton (Annie McEnroe) in tow, for Transylania, to help Stefan in his werewolf killing mission.

The story is absurd, the dialogue hilariously awful; poor Sir Christopher and Sybil have to utter some pretty dumb lines. The makeup effects are crude to the nth degree, but are delicious in their egregious lack of quality. The scene with the eyeballs exploding is pretty cool. In some ways, "Stirba - Werewolf Bitch" goes back to Gothic basics in a way by exploiting flavourful European Old World atmosphere. But it adds a lot of spice to the deal by being so damn trashy. The sexy ladies present dress quite provocatively, and Sybil is willing to disrobe and show off her ample assets. The New Wave pop soundtrack is a total hoot; we're made to listen to that priceless title theme song a number of times. Original "Howling" author Gary Brandner co-scripted, from his novel "Howling II: The Return", and maintains a very tongue in cheek approach. With the level of both cheese and trash on display, it's clear that this was never meant to be taken seriously.

Sir Christopher looks pretty serious here, though; the movie does benefit from his professionalism. Sybil is a mildly amusing antagonist. Brown and McEnroe are just sort of there as hero and heroine. Marsha A. Hunt, Judd Omen, Ferdy Mayne (who has the same character name as John Carradine in "Howling" No. 1), Patrick Field, Jimmy Nail, and Jiri Krytinar co-star.

Directed by Philippe Mora, who has the distinction of being director on two "Howling" sequels, the other being "The Marsupials: The Howling III".

The end credits are actually a highlight.

Seven out of 10.

This is a pretty bad movie. But not so bad as it's reputation suggests. The production values aren't too bad and there is the odd effective scene. And it does have an 80's cheezoid veneer that means that it is always kind of fun. Watch out, too, for Jimmy Nail's brief appearance - his attempt at an American accent is so astoundingly rubbish it's fantastic. Fantastic too are Sybil Danning's breasts - they make a brief appearance in the movie but the scene is repeated umpteen times in the end credits in what can only be described as the 12" remix of Sybil Danning's boobs. Has to be seen to be believed. As a horror movie it isn't scary, the effects are silly and Christopher Lee turns up to sleepwalk through his performance. I guess he was buying a new house and needed some cash for the deposit. The two central characters - the man and the woman - were so negligible that I have forgotten almost everything about them and I just watched this movie earlier tonight. The werewolves are noticeably less impressive than in the original movie, in fact, bizarrely, they sometimes look more like badly burned apes. The eastern European setting is quite good and the music provided by the new wave band Babel, while being pretty terrible, does at least give the film some added cheese.

Overall? Good for a laugh. Not good quality but did you seriously expect it to be? And, at the very least, you've always got Sybil's knockers.