Night of the Werewolf (1981)

In the 1600s, witch-vampire Countess Elizabeth Bathory (Julia Saly) is locked away while her enslaved werewolf servant Waldemar Daninsky (Paul Naschy) is executed with a silver cross-dagger. In modern times, gaverobbers pull out the cross, resurrecting Daninsky, who takes up residence in an abandoned castle. Meanwhile, three researchers, Erika (Silvia Aguilar), Mircaya (Beatriz Elorrieta), and Karen (Azucena Hernández) come searching for Bathory’s tomb, but secretly Erika is a witch who has come to resurrect the Countess. With their car broken, they are taken in by Naschy who hopes that Karen will fall in love with him, and use the cross to destroy him forever. Erika is successful, setting up a battle between vampires and werewolf.

A little background: Paul Naschy (real name Jacinto Molina Alvarez) was the most important horror filmmaker in Europe, though he is almost unknown in the United States. As he repeatedly stated, Spain’s culture looks down upon any type of fantasy, particularly horror. There’s no history of fantastic literature, and horror films were unknown. At an early age Naschy saw Frankenstein Meets The Wolf Man and it made quite an impression. He starred in nearly 60 horror films, playing every monster you can name, and added writing, directing, and producing to his resume, almost single-handily creating horror cinema in his home country.

While low budget films, his features boasted sharp color—with rich red blood, and beautiful exteriors; an advantage of filming in Southern Europe is the prevalence of real castles and ancient ruins. He also sprinkled in a dab of nudity with a great deal more skill than Hammer, and a general feeling of fun.

He is best known as the cursed Polish werewolf Waldemar Daninsky that he played in twelve pictures. He identified with Daninsky, so it isn’t surprising that he made a heroic, brave, and strong, if someone sensitive, character. And with a mash-up as his inspiration, his werewolf generally fought one or more other monsters: vampires, the mummy, Frankenstein’s Monster, demons, Dr. Jykell, and even aliens. The films ignored continuity, with Daninsky sometimes being a modern man, sometimes a medieval knight, and being made into a werewolf in at least three different ways. He even remade his own movies.

Naschy loved the mash-up of the Wolf Man and a vampire queen. He first put them together in Walpurgis Night (1971) which was retitled The Werewolf Versus the Vampire Woman in the US. He returned to the team-up in 1973’s Curse of the Devil, and here he does it again, though this time it might be considered a remake of the first film. There’s certainly a lot of similarities, including the “scientist” girls researching the tomb of the vampire and bringing her back to life, one of them being turned into a vampire, the vampire waiting for the full moon when she can summon Satan and take over the world, the secluded location where Daninsky stays with one female sidekick, the prophecy that he can only die at the hands of a woman who loves him, a rapid romance with one of the visiting girls, the silver cross dagger that is effective on all evil, a lot of time searching for the crypt, and a few more that I’ll skip as it would be revealing too much.

The big apparent change is making Daninsky four hundred years old instead of around thirty, but it turns out not to matter. Except for his choice of clothing and his skill with a crossbow, he acts like a modern man and knows about current events. Naschy plays the character the same as before, except he’s ten years older and has a beard, both of which look good on him. The actresses are all beautiful and competent, as they were before. The sets are a bit nicer, and they found a striking old castle for their exteriors. There’s some gothic vampire fun, a touch of nudity, blood, and the final dust up as there was before.

So which film is better? Naschy goes with this one, which isn’t surprising since he took over the director’s chair, but he’s wrong. There’s just too many “What the Hell” moments that pulled me out of the film. Time doesn’t make any sense, with Daninsky just waking up, but having to have been there for years, and a servant who can’t be fit into any timeline. Weeks will pass between scenes with no more notice than a night. No one acts sensibly. Daninsky not only doesn’t lock himself up during the full moon; he just hangs around the castle; not a good idea when you don’t want to kill your new love. He could have easily stopped Erika before she woke the Countess, but he doesn’t bother. By the rules they lay out, his loving servant should have been able to kill him, but that’s ignored. The Countess says she must have the werewolf as her slave to survive until the ritual, but then she doesn’t need him at all and just wants him for after. Likewise, Daninsky says he’ll only be strong enough to face her when he’s become a wolf, but then he just reverses that, deciding that he must face her only when he isn’t one.

The entire film is oddly disjointed. The Werewolf Versus the Vampire Woman had a rushed romance, but in this one it takes place off screen. Daninsky and his servant speak about how the girl, who he has not spoken to yet, is his one hope of love, and after a cutaway, Daninsky and Karen are kissing on the walkway and swearing their love.

This all sounds negative, but take it as a comparison to the earlier film. This is still a Naschy werewolf movie. It looks good and has all that sexy, gory monster fun. The flaws just pull it down, making The Werewolf Versus the Vampire Woman your better choice.