The Wolf Man (1941) - film review

After 18 years, Larry Talbot returns to his family home to take the place of his elder brother, who died in a hunting accident.  Shortly after his arrival, he is attracted to Gwen, the daughter of an antiques dealer, and takes her to a gypsy fair with her friend Jenny.  That night, Larry sees a wolf suddenly attack Jenny.  He beats the wolf to death with his walking stick but is bitten.  The next day, Larry can find no trace of the wolf bite and no one believes his story about his killing a wolf.  A gypsy woman tells him that the creature he killed was her son, who had been afflicted with an ancient curse which transformed him into a wolf each autumn when the moon is bright.  To his horror, Larry realises that the curse has passed to him...

After Dracula, Frankenstein and the Mummy, the Wolf Man entered Universal Pictures’ family of popular horror creations when this spine-chilling monster film hit cinema screens across America in 1941.  Universal had previously played around with the idea of lycanthropy in their 1935 film Werewolf of London (1935), but this was essentially just a reworking of the Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde story and the monster in that film bears no resemblance to the feral hirsute creation that Lon Chaney Jr brought to life in the 1940s.

Whilst manifestly not in the league of some of Universal’s earlier great monster films, The Wolf Man is an atmospheric and entertaining film which boasts a few memorable expressionistic touches and some genuinely chilling moments.    The creepy transformation of Larry Talbot into the Wolf Man isn’t as ambitious as in later films, but it was an achievement for its time, taking around twenty hours to record a shot that lasts a mere few seconds.

The iconic Wolf Man make-up was designed by Jack Pierce, Universal’s ace make-up artist, who had previously created the Frankenstein monster look for Boris Karloff in the 1930s.  The make-up took around six hours to apply and, being composed mainly of yak’s hair, was extremely uncomfortable to wear.

The concept for the Wolf Man came from screenwriter Curt Siodmak, who, not having a source novel to fall back on (as had been the case with Dracula and Frankenstein), developed the monster’s story from his own imagination.  Siodmak was one of Germany’s most promising writers of fantasy fiction before the rise of Nazism forced him to flee his country and take up work as a screenwriter in Hollywood.  His brother was the distinguished film director Robert Siodmak.   In interviews, Curt Siodmak remarked that the Wolf Man story was influenced by his experiences in Germany of the 1930s, with the rise of the Fascists representing a kind of assertion of man’s darker, animalistic side over the side that is morally superior, a kind of collective reversion to man’s bestial past.

The Wolf Man’s impressive production values are bolstered by an equally impressive cast, which includes such distinguished actors as Claude Rains, star of the earlier Universal film The Invisible man (1933), and Bela Lugosi, who appeared in various Universal films, notably  Dracula (1931).   Against such a strong supporting cast, the less experienced Lon Chaney Jr is bound to stand out as the weak link, but whilst he may struggle to impress as the human Larry Talbot, he certainly delivers the goods as the monstrous Wolf Man.   Anyone who doubts Lon Chaney Jr’s acting potential should take a look at his portrayal of Lennie in Lewis Milestone’s 1939 adaptation of John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men.

The Wolf Man was Universal’s most successful film in 1941, ensuring that a return appearance of the creature was inevitable.  The Wolf Man next reared his shaggy head in Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man (1943) and in three other films before bowing out in style in Bud Abbott and Lou Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948).  On each occasion, the Wolf Man was played by Lon Chaney Jr, the only actor to play his monster throughout the entire run of the Universal films.

© James Travers 2008

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