Here's a film I read about in one of the monster mags back in the '60s. The pictures in the article looked cool and scary, so I anticipated eventually seeing the movie. Little did I know it would take 40 more years. Back then, foreign imports like ATOM AGE VAMPIRE made their way to Saturday Matinee's and onto the tube in Philly, but DORMITORY did not. I often wondered about this film and being a werewolf fan, it bugged me that I never saw it. Now through the magic of cheap DVD sets, I finally got to view it.
Originally called LYCANTHROPUS, this Italian/Austrian production was dubbed into English and released in America as WEREWOLF IN A GIRLS' DORMITORY. It's interesting to see how European horror films were progressing at the time, and WEREWOLF displays the look and feel of that era. Not necessarily a great film, it does manage to entertain and provide scary moments. The musical score is particularly creepy.
They do a good job keeping the werewolf's identity a mystery by providing several suspects, and some of the night scenes in the woods are downright eerie.
I really liked the makeup on this beastie. It's minimal in the tradition of WEREWOLF OF LONDON and some of the images are a bit graphic for the times.
For the U.S release, a fun rock 'n roll tune called THE GHOUL IN SCHOOL was added to the opening credits. Due to copyright issues, the song is played only briefly on the Madacy disk I bought. Retromedia's DVD does not have it at all, but reviews claim Retro's is the best version of the film which features an audio commentary with one of the stars, Curt Lowens.
In the tradition of the
MONSTER MASH, THE GHOUL IN SCHOOL tune is catchy and sounds like it could be another Monster Kid anthem. Here's the brief sampling from the Madacy DVD =>
http://lunkenstein.lunkhead.net/audio/goul_in_school1.wav (oops, misspelled ghoul)
Now, don't ya wanna hear the whole song? I sure do. If anyone knows of where it can be had, please let me know.
Thanks,
Lunkenstein