Night of the Howling Beast

Here's a wacky adventure-horror film with splats of gore, a few sexy ladies and two famous monsters. Made in the 70's, The Werewolf And The Yeti was banned in Britain during the Video Nasty madness of the 80's for reasons even harder to fathom than usual, and stayed banned.

The yeti attacks some folks in Tibet before the credits have rolled, immediately establishing the pace for the film: fast! Within minutes the good guys have thrown together a major expedition and are trekking through the Tibetan mountains in an attempt to find out what weird stuff is going on up there. The answer is complicated. The superstitious sherpas won't stop raving about demons in this land, but the real problem is the shrine-guarding vampire women who like a bit of male-straddling on the one hand and snarling like hyenas as they fight over bloody entrails on the other. The hero does manage to escape from this delicate web of sex and violence, but not before he's been afflicted with the curse of werewolfism! As if life isn't complicated enough, the yeti's still at large and evil raiders are starting to attack folks indiscriminately all over the mountains. This all makes for the sensation of as much action as it sounds like it would. Somehow the film achieves a consistently tense feel, more by the portentous way that everyone talks about the situations they're in than by the actual portrayal of those situations. This isn't to downplay the considerable amount of action that there is, including gunfights, swashbuckling, dungeon torture and monster combat. But I do regard this likable film as a triumph of what's good about exploitation - getting maximum cinematic effect out of modest resources. Technically it's good too. I don't know if some mountain stuff was shot day for night, but the intense blue scenes in the snow are atmospheric, as is the oft-scary score. Note however that the use of 'Scotland The Brave' on the soundtrack over establishing shots of England is of a different kind of scary, as is a lot of the dubbed dialogue.

Macroscopic logic isn't The Werewolf And The Yeti's strong point, but few films throw together as many elements as this one does and still achieve something basically coherent, fun and with good exploitation bang for your buck. Seeing this film made me wish they still made stuff like this today.

If you've seen any of Paul Naschy's other 'hombre lobo' films, you probably have a pretty good idea of what to expect from The Werewolf and the Yeti—schlocky dialogue, hammy acting, Naschy once again sporting terrible wolf make-up, some sexy Euro-totty, and a bit of unrealistic bright-red gore. In short, a fun slice of very silly Spanish monster madness.

One can only presume, therefore, that it must have been one hell of a slow day at the office when the BBFC/DPP decided to stick The Werewolf and the Yeti on the Official Nasties list: the film has its unsavoury moments, as do most horror films, but there's nothing to warrant it being lumped with likes of genuinely disturbing flicks such as Cannibal Holocaust, Faces of Death and Gestapo's Last Orgy. Any violence or sadism in The Werewolf and the Yeti is handled in such a camp manner that it's almost impossible to take offence at.

Take the flaying of sexy young scientist Melody (the gorgeous Verónica Miriel) by evil bitch Wandessa (Silvia Solar), for example: the effects are so cheap and unrealistic that one cannot help but find the scene amusing, no matter how repulsive the idea. Likewise, the sight of one of the scientists impaled on a wooden stake (ala Cannibal Holocaust) is rendered laughable by the fact that he is not only still alive, but also capable of holding a conversation with our hero.

Also providing mucho unintentional chuckles: the scene where Naschy kills a pair of semi-naked werewolf/vampire/witch women (but only after having sex with them both, of course); the ridiculous fight between Naschy and dermatologically challenged bandit/warlord Sekkar Khan (Luis Induni); and the rousing finale, in which our hero, transformed into a drooling beast by the full moon, rescues his love Sylvia (Mercedes Molina) from the abominable snowman.

It's all utter nonsense, not at all scary and certainly not nasty enough to deserve being banned, but still worth a go if you're in the mood for a bit of a giggle.

Waldemar (Paul Naschy), the renowned adventurer, joins an expedition to find the Yeti in the Himalayas. While hiking the mountains, he is captured by two cannibalistic demon nymphets guarding a remote Buddhist temple and becomes their sex slave.

This film ignores the events from the earlier films "The Fury of the Wolfman" (1970) and "Curse of the Devil" (1972), and provided an all-new origin for Waldemar's lycanthropy, having the curse transmitted by the bites of not one, but two, vampire women! The mix of supernatural creatures is certainly a good deal of fun.

The film was banned in the UK by the BBFC under the Video Recordings Act of 1984 and was featured on the "Video Nasties" list. It has allegedly never been released in the UK. But for us lucky Americans, the film is now available on Blu-ray from Scream! Factory. It is fairly bare bones, with no commentary or other features, but we do get to choose between English and Spanish, which is nice.

Paul Naschy, the Spanish Lon Chaney, made 12 films as Waldemar Daninsky, and this video nasty is number eight. It was banned in Britain and never released there.

Here, he is after the Abominable Snowman, or Bigfoot as it is known in America, in Tibet. He stumbles into a sacred cave guarded by two sisters, who are also cannibals, and they use him for breeding. He kills them, but not before they turn him into a werewolf.

He begins roaming the mountain attacking the others in the hunting party. That's not the only thing they have to worry about as Sekkar Khan's (Luis Induni)bandits roam the mountain also.

The Werewolf is not all bad, as he saves Sylvia (Grace Mills) from being raped. Of course as Waldemar, he is in love with her.

After being captured by Sekkar Khan, they are at the mercy of the evil sorceress Wandesa (Silvia Solar). Will his curse allow him to save everyone? There will certainly be lots of nudity and torture before that happens! It was an enjoyable film with good music, and, yes, the Werewolf and the Yeti do meet and battle at the end.

THE WEREWOLF AND THE YETI is really a misnomer, but then NIGHT OF THE HOWLING BEAST (the title borne by the print I watched) doesn't do it justice either as the story spans not one but several nights, none of which is more important than the other! Anyway, this isn't a bad effort in Naschy's ongoing "Waldemar Daninsky" saga - hampered slightly by the disc freezing up momentarily on four separate occasions, particularly towards the end: plot-packed though it is, the film is actually pretty straightforward compared to the others I've watched by Naschy - it is indeed livelier than any of them - and the snowy locales in which it is set are a major asset (despite the minimal budget on hand). Naschy turns in a creditable performance (though he was reportedly dissatisfied with how the film turned out), but the werewolf make-up is a matter of taste as it's certainly not scary-looking; the Yeti, then, hardly bears a mention as its function is almost incidental to the narrative and is not even given a distinguished 'look' to make it stand out during the climactic duel. The director's overall style, alas, is rather flat: the Gothic atmosphere one associates with this type of film is mostly lacking here. Apart from this, none of the characters is all that interesting (wicked sorceress Wandesa is especially annoying) but, at least, there's some gore to keep one watching (a male member of the expedition ends up impaled on a thick pole whereas a girl is skinned alive!) and the fist-fight between Waldemar and the villainous Sekkar Khan is quite energetic; there's also a welcome - and wholly gratuitous - touch of eroticism in the sequence where Waldemar meets two vampires-cum-cannibals in a cave who, apparently, also have the power to infect him with 'The Curse Of The Beast'!!