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There are few things in this world that get me more excited than werewolves. If I could be
one, I would. I wouldn’t be the guy running from the werewolf in the movie. I’d hold out my
arm and say “Pretty please!” This makes me a sucker for werewolf movies. I do not…and I
repeat DO NOT care how dumb, cheap, crass, cheesy, tropey, or terrible the movie looks— I
will give it a shot. This being said, I have devoured countless werewolf films over the years,
Some good, some bad, and some forgettable.
As we approach Halloween, this is the time of year people go to the internet to find movie
recommendations. If you search “best werewolf movies”, you’ll find all the usual suspects:
The Wolf Man, American Werewolf in London, Dog Soldiers, Silver Bullet, The Howling,
Ginger Snaps, The Company of Wolves, etc. Even if you look up “underrated werewolf
movies” you’ll find films like Wolf of Snow Hollow, Howl, Werewolves Within, Bad Moon, Wild
Country, etc. Still stuff most werewolf fans have seen. But we are going deeper. Deeper than
Werewolf in a Girl’s Dormitory, Mom, Full Moon High, Project Metalbeast, Wolfcop, I Was a
Teenage Werewolf, and Wer.
I’m reaching my hand farther down into the werewolf movie bend. Almost like digging
through the five dollar bucket at Walmart and pulling out gold. I’m going to give you werewolf
movie recommendations that no one talks about. These are films that get overlooked every
single year and go unwatched by fans of the genre. And it’s a shame, because many of the
ones on this list are good. Most of them are old, while some of them are foreign films from
decades ago, which is another reason they probably get overlooked. So without further delay
and in no particular order, here are thirteen of my most underrated werewolf films you need
to see.
I’ve seen this television series make a few lists, but it doesn’t get the attention it deserves.
So I’m going to talk about it. The show first aired on FOX on July 11, 1987 and ran through
August 21, 1988. It was created by Frank Lupo, the same man who gave us The A-Team,
and ran for 29 episodes.
The series follows college student Eric Cord who is forced to kill his best friend and
roommate, Ted, after Ted transforms into a werewolf and attacks him. In the process, Eric is
bitten and cursed. To rid himself of the curse, Eric hits the road to track down Janos
Skorzeny, the original source of his bloodline, believing that killing him will cure the infection.
Later in the series, the true ancient immortal mastermind behind the bloodline is revealed.
This series is good, cheesy, made for television fun. Its style is much like The Incredible Hulk
show from the late 70s as well. If you want to give it a shot, you can find episodes streaming
on YouTube for free.
A werewolf movie starring Tim Curry? Yes, please. You will never convince me that this film
didn’t get overshadowed by Ginger Snaps dropping a year earlier…that and it was released
on the USA Network. Both films share thematic and narrative similarities about female
focused werewolves and body horror. Both films use a dramatic physical transformation
involving hair, fur, or feral changes as an explicit metaphor for the awkwardness, alienation,
and unwanted changes of growing up as a teenage girl. Both Tara in Wolf Girl and Ginger in
Ginger Snaps experience a shift where shedding or altering their societal constraints
unleashes a violent, animalistic, and vengeful side against the people who bully or objectify
them. Both films are also Canadian-produced horror/drama projects released back-to-back
at the turn of the millennium that toy with classic monster tropes outside of major Hollywood
studio formulas usually shoved down our throats.
The film follows Tara, a teenager with hypertrichosis who is the star attraction of a traveling
freak show. Desperate to escape the bullies in a small town, she takes an experimental hair-
removal serum from a local boy. The good news? The hair disappears. The bad news? It
turns her into a feral, violent beast out for blood.
I enjoy this movie because it blends the whole classic sideshow atmosphere with a great
coming of age storyline. You can find it streaming for free on Amazon, Tubi, The Roku
Channel, and YouTube.
I find it hard to believe that his movie never makes any werewolf lists. It stars Peter
Cushing…PETER CUSHING! It was also directed by Frederick William Francis. If the name
sounds somewhat familiar, it’s because he also directed Hammer Studio films such as The
Evil of Frankenstein and Dracula Has Risen from the Grave.
In this British horror flick, Etoile, a young man raised by wolves, joins a traveling circus freak
show. After falling in love with a beautiful prostitute in Paris, his primal instincts ignite,
transforming him into a bloodthirsty werewolf by night. As a series of gruesome murders
plagues the city, a determined coroner closes in on the beast.
If you love Peter Cushing being delightfully macabre, 19th-century Paris backdrops, and
classic wolf-man makeup, you’re going to want to check this one out. You can find it
streaming for free on YouTube.
The plot follows a Scotland Yard investigator who looks into mysterious attacks on an
isolated British Island. It is soon discovered that there is a curse on a family who is inflicted
with hereditary lycanthropy.
The movie is a black and white film that has a great mood and creepy atmosphere. I enjoy
this one because it does a great job of blending the gothic werewolf trope with a “who done
it” storyline. You can find it streaming for free on YouTube.
This is another Bella Lugosi vampire flick that features a werewolf as one of the major
characters. In 1918, a family terrorized by a vampire finally defeat it. Years later, German
bombs from World War II release the vampire from his grave. The vampire reclaims the soul
of his wolf man servant and takes on the identity of a scientist who has just escaped a
concentration camp. He and his wolf man then seek revenge on the family who tried to kill
him.
I love the great visuals of fog covered cemetery sets in this film. It’s atmospheric, gothic
horror with classic, spooky cinematography featuring the vampire and werewolf. You can
find it streaming for free on Tubi or YouTube.
This is the first French film on the list, and it has an interesting history. It was made when the
Germans occupied France. The gothic style film used its fantasy/historical costume settings
as a way to subtly express descent against the Germans.
The story follows a young governess named Monique who arrives at a secluded, gloomy
countryside castle to educate the daughter of Reginald de Malveneur. Reginald is an
obsessive research scientist consumed by a centuries-old family curse of lycanthropy and is
desperate to find a cell-rejuvenation cure for his ailing wife. The scientist and his
gamekeeper mysteriously vanish, Monique then teams up with a local painter to untangle
the dark secrets hiding within the estate's subterranean laboratories before the curse claims
its next victim.
This film relies heavily on atmosphere, shadow lighting, and psychological terror. It’s not for
everyone, and some have criticised it because it doesn’t show a hairy werewolf
transformation. However, if you are in the mood for something that is akin to the old
Universal Monster Movies meets The Hounds of Baskerville, then you’ll want to check this
one out. It’s extremely difficult to find streaming but sometimes you can catch it on YouTube.
This film was the first of only three American werewolf films made in the 1950s. It was
released in 1956 as the second of a double feature with Earth vs the Flying Saucers.
The storyline follows Duncan Marsh, a man with amnesia who is injected with an "irradiated
wolf serum” by some doctors with zero medical ethics. The concoction transforms him into a
werewolf when he undergoes emotional distress… and the chaos ensues.
I enjoy this one because it doesn’t follow the normal werewolf transformation tropes.
Supernatural curses are replaced with Cold War era science experiments. Instead of
lycanthropy being passed through bites and transformations taking place because of full
moons, we get an unwilling human guinea pig transformed by radioactive werewolf serum.
You can find the movie streaming on Amazon Prime and Tubi.
If you liked 1942’s Cat People then you might want to move this one to the top of your list. It
is definitely a knock off of the popular film…but not in a bad way. The movie is basically
about a Romani princess who transforms into a wolf to protect her family’s legacy.
A Museum curator in New Orleans discovers the secret tomb and history of Marie LaTour, a
former family matriarch who is rumored to be a werewolf. Celeste LaTour, the Romani
princess, fears the curator will go public with the secret so she turns into a wolf and kills him.
The police set out to solve the murder while Celeste uses mind control over everyone to hide
her identity. Things escalate and the hunt ensues for Celeste.
One thing I love about this film is we get a female as the werewolf, which was quite counter
cultural for the day. It also has great shadow lighting and a great mortuary set piece. The
museum in the beginning of the movie is atmospheric and spooky. If you want to give this
one a go, you can find it streaming for free on Tubi and YouTube.
The first Mexican werewolf horror to make the list. La Loba is another film that gives us a
great female werewolf.
A young woman from a rich Mexican family is under a curse that causes her to transform
into a werewolf at night and kill people. In order to find a cure from her curse, she seeks out
a doctor who she then falls in love with. Lucky for her, he turns out to be a werewolf too. The
two go on a lovers killing spree until they come face to face with a trained werewolf killing
dog.
One of my favorite things about this movie is that the first ten minutes contain no dialogue,
and gives us some hot, atmospheric creature stalking action through the woods. The acting
is great in this movie and so are the werewolf’s movements. A few of the Spanish language
werewolf movies I wanted to include on this list are hard to find…so I left them out. But La
Loba is one you can stream on Amazon and YouTube.
I’ll be honest. This movie requires a particular movie pallet that you either have or don’t
have. If you’re like me, and Satanic panic style exploitation of black magic, monks, and
werewolves light your fire, then you might like the way this film tastes.
The plot (if you can call it that) follows a biker gang that stumbles upon a monastery where
the monks are partaking in Satan worship. The monks try to persuade one of the female
bikers, Helen, to become a satanic sacrifice. The bikers don’t take kindly to this. They smash
up the monastery and leave. But it doesn’t matter. The ritual was already done and as a
result, Helen becomes possessed at night and changes into a werewolf.
Let me hit you with some more honesty before you decide to take the dive into this one. The
plot is hard to follow and almost nonexistent. The pacing is not good and the writing is just
awful. With that said, it is also campy and very “drive in theater” like and has a certain
amount of charm. I hesitated to put it on the list but I figured there might still be some die
hard 70’s exploitation fans out there who would appreciate it. You can find it streaming for
free on Tubi, Amazon, YouTube, and The Roku Channel.
This Spanish film is an interesting one. It’s based on the novel by Carlos Martínez-Barbeito,
and also partially based on the life of Manuel Blanco Romasanta, who was alleged to have
lycanthropy.
Benito Freire lives in a world full of superstition and ignorance. The perfect place for a lonely,
miserable peddler. As a peddler, Benito wanders from town to town, where he has fits of
epilepsy. Rumors start to spread that he is a demon possessed werewolf. The psychological
damage is too much for Benito, and he slowly descends into madness.
I love this film simply because, like the Video Nasties, it too was condemned by Spanish
society at the time. In fact, the screenwriter/director Pedro Olea said he was forced to tone
down the novel’s violence along with its anti-religious tone in order to avoid censorship. But it
didn’t work. The film received blistering criticism for its anti-religious message and negative
portrayal of Spanish society at the time. It was censored and denounced by myriads of
critics. Support banned films and check this one out. You can find it streaming for free on
Tubi.
There’s a movie from 2010 with the same name. This isn’t that one.
In this film, Robert takes his son Richie to a secluded mountain cabin for a weekend. While
they are out on a nighttime hike under the full moon, they are attacked by a ravenous
creature. During the fight, Robert is bitten and the creature falls into a ravine where it is
impaled on a wooden fence and dies. Robert then becomes a werewolf and Richie tries to
warn others…but nobody believes him.
This film is pure B-movie campiness at its finest. It’s fun, and the werewolf design is sort of
Teen Wolf like. There’s some interesting subplots that provide some great dark humor. My
personal favorite is the “Jesus Freak” one. In the movie, there is a commune made up of
Christian hippies. There’s some unintentional humor, and you’re going to love it when the
werewolf attacks their camp. You can find it streaming for free on YouTube
Yes, another 1970s werewolf movie. I’m a little biased, what can I say? This one is quite
different from the others on the list. La Bete is a French errotic horror film, and as a fair
warning, has some explicit sexual scenes in it. In certain places the film is also a loose
adaptation of the novella Lokis by Prosper Menmee, namely the dream sequence.
The plot follows a wealthy American heiress who travels to a crumbling French estate to
finalize an arranged marriage to an eccentric aristocratic heir. However, her impending
nuptials are derailed when she uncovers a dark, perverted family legend. This eventually
leads to a feverish, surreal, and deeply explicit dream sequence involving a monstrous
cryptid that completely flips the "Beauty and the Beast" fairytale on its head.
This movie is peak 1970s euro-cult cinema. It is a truly bizarre gothic tale that is surreal and
shocking. Its dream sequence scene is controversial, and is an historic piece of 70’s
transgressive cinema. The movie is extremely hard to find streaming, but Arrow put out a
blu-ray if anyone is interested in making it a part of your collection.
What are some of your favorite, most underrated werewolf movies? Let us know in the comments or on social media!
JD Hill is a horror author and VHS archaeologist with a love for the strange, the obscure and the terrifying. A champion of creature features, practical effects, drive-in oddities and the glorious weirdness of 70s and 80s horror, JD digs deep into horror history, unearthing the forgotten monsters, midnight movies and video nasties that raised a generation of horror fans.
In Video Vengeance, he’s your guide to the weird, wonderful, and wonderfully horrific corners of the genre. So grab a tape, dim the lights, and stay tuned for more forgotten frights!
