Werewolf
Even a man who is pure in heart and says his prayers by night may become a wolf when the wolfbane blooms and the autumn moon is bright.
A werewolf is a man or woman who has been afflicted with the cursed disease known as lycanthropy. This affliction causes the host to become a violent wolf-man hybrid when exposed to a full moon. Werewolves have extraordinary regeneration and can only be killed with silver, which is a common defense against undead fiends as well.
The first film to prominently feature a werewolf character was Universal's Werewolf of London in 1935, but the most notable film is The Wolf Man from 1941, starring Lon Chaney Jr. in the iconic and tragic role of Larry Talbot--a role he would reprise in various sequels.
In 1943, Universal made cinematic history by merging the mythologies of both Frankenstein and the Wolf Man by making the first monster mash, "Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man", in which Bela Lugosi (formerly the gypsy and original werewolf in The Wolf Man) now playing the Frankenstein Monster (with Ygor's brian). Yes, it gets convoluted, but that didn't stop Universal from following it up with more monster mashes, such as "House of Frankenstein" (1944), "House of Dracula" (1945), and "Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein" (1948). Essentially, werewolves had become commonplace in the genre, and stood tall in the likes of ghosts, vampires, witches, and other spooky Halloween/horror imagery.
Hammer Horror tried their hand at werewolves with 1961's "Curse of the Werewolf", starring Oliver Reed as the werewolf. However, Hammer had a tendency to waste time with dull dialogue, so no sequels were ever produced.
Werewolves didn't get cool again until the gothic soap opera Dark Shadows introduced werewolves into their monster-mash mythology in 1969.
In 1981, werewolves came back to the spotlight with John Landis's "An American Werewolf in London" and Joe Dante's "The Howling" (which spawned several shitty sequels). Unfortunately, they never got much better than that.
The first film to prominently feature a werewolf character was Universal's Werewolf of London in 1935, but the most notable film is The Wolf Man from 1941, starring Lon Chaney Jr. in the iconic and tragic role of Larry Talbot--a role he would reprise in various sequels.
In 1943, Universal made cinematic history by merging the mythologies of both Frankenstein and the Wolf Man by making the first monster mash, "Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man", in which Bela Lugosi (formerly the gypsy and original werewolf in The Wolf Man) now playing the Frankenstein Monster (with Ygor's brian). Yes, it gets convoluted, but that didn't stop Universal from following it up with more monster mashes, such as "House of Frankenstein" (1944), "House of Dracula" (1945), and "Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein" (1948). Essentially, werewolves had become commonplace in the genre, and stood tall in the likes of ghosts, vampires, witches, and other spooky Halloween/horror imagery.
Hammer Horror tried their hand at werewolves with 1961's "Curse of the Werewolf", starring Oliver Reed as the werewolf. However, Hammer had a tendency to waste time with dull dialogue, so no sequels were ever produced.Werewolves didn't get cool again until the gothic soap opera Dark Shadows introduced werewolves into their monster-mash mythology in 1969.
In 1981, werewolves came back to the spotlight with John Landis's "An American Werewolf in London" and Joe Dante's "The Howling" (which spawned several shitty sequels). Unfortunately, they never got much better than that.