The Curse of the Werewolf (1961)

Assuming I'm counting right, Christmas takes up between three and four minutes of screentime in this 1961 Hammer horror film, which tells you two things off the bat. First, this isn't a Christmas movie. And second, something about those three-to-four minutes must be pretty damn interesting if I'm writing about it here (particularly because this isn't one of the studio's better regarded films).

Before we get into any of that, let's tackle the most pressing question for most of you: should you bother watching this? The answer, as is often the case, depends. The Curse of the Werewolf has a number of factors in its favor, including some gorgeous, colorful cinematography, an updated take on the wolf man popularized by Universal a few decades earlier, bits of authentic folklore (including that Christmas bit we'll be getting back to), and some impressive makeup and visual effects. At the same time, the movie's structure meanders more than it should, the Spanish accents used by British actors aren't at all convincing, and the movie's subtext is muddled. There are some great, emotionally resonant concepts in here, but it's just as easy to interpret the film as excusing male violence.

Those of you familiar with the brand probably have a good idea whether Hammer's sole entry into the werewolf subgenre is something you need to see. For the rest of you, Hammer Films is primarily remembered as a leader in horror, suspense, and crime cinema from the 50s through the 70s. We've also reviewed their movie Cash on Demand, released the same year (which, unlike The Curse of the Werewolf, absolutely counts as a Christmas movie). They were known for delivering more violence, gore, and sexual content than most of their mainstream competitors, while at the same time offering something smarter than you'd expect from exploitation. As far as the sex and violence are concerned, rest assured that something like The Curse of the Werewolf looks and feels closer to PG-13 in today's world.

Regardless, I wouldn't consider this essential viewing for anyone who's not fascinated with werewolves, folklore, Hammer films, or the history of Christmas horror. But then that brings us back to those three or four minutes.

The sequences in question concern the birth of the movie's protagonist, Leon, an event which occurs quite a bit later in the film than you'd expect. Leon's mother is a mute servant who'd been abused by a sociopathic marquess and raped by a feral beggar locked in a dungeon (this movie has way too much backstory for its own good). The beggar, who's ambiguously wolf-like himself, dies the morning after the assault, and the woman kills the marquess in defense after he attempts to assault her as well. She's eventually taken in by a scholar and his housekeeper, the latter of whom realizes the woman is pregnant. As Christmas approaches, the housekeeper becomes terrified that the baby may be born on the holiday. The scholar doesn't see an issue - wouldn't that be a good omen? The housekeeper knows better, explaining the day is reserved for Christ, and that God will curse any other child born on His son's birthday.

The movie didn't invent this. European folklore often held that babies born on or around Christmas were destined (or at least more likely) to become werewolves later in life. In the movie the housekeeper talks about how women in her village would avoid men in March and April to prevent this from occurring to their children. I'm not sure whether that part has historical precedent, though it seems likely. It's also worth noting that, particularly in northern Europe, there'd be advantages in not giving birth around midwinter due to the harsh weather and scarcity of food. Mortality from childbirth and infancy were high enough already, so it's not surprising to find myths cautioning against having children during the coldest, darkest weeks. As modern technology removes these added risks (to say nothing of education dispelling the myth Jesus was actually born on December 25th), associations with kids and Christmas have inverted this dynamic, leading to scores of movies and shows instead romanticizing the idea of Christmas babies.

To be clear, there's nothing at all wrong with traditions evolving (and I certainly don't think kids born around the holidays should be saddled with the baggage of being "cursed" in addition to having to share their birthday with the largest holiday of the year). But as a fan of folklore, I appreciate movies like this bringing some of these connections to the forefront. Before Halloween replaced it, Christmas was considered the scariest time of the year, a tradition that survived in British Christmas ghost stories, which The Curse of the Werewolf could be seen as an extension of.

That's not to say the movie is a faithful recreation or adaptation of folklore. There's more of Universal's Wolf Man in the design and abilities of the monster than medieval myth. The character has the supernatural strength of modern stories, along with the hybrid form popularized by Hollywood. But he's also a blood-drinker (modern stories have split vampires and werewolves into distinct groups, but there's a great deal of overlap in older tales). All this makes for a fascinating hybrid of folklore and movie creature that, if nothing else, is enjoyable to watch.

Okay, now that I've written the equivalent of several pages of exposition before getting to the actual movie, I'm in a position to describe the first half hour of said movie, which approaches its narrative with a similar disregard for concise storytelling.

I kid, but the intro isn't actually bad, per se. As a sort of standalone short film, it makes for an engaging, twisted fairytale, complete with lavish sets and costumes, and a winding plot that leaves the viewer interested but uncertain where any of this is heading. At first, the protagonist appears to be a beggar who winds up at a wedding party for a cruel marquess and his new bride, who also briefly seems like a significant character. The beggar just wants some food, while the marquess finds ways of humiliating and demeaning him. When his new bride takes pity on the beggar and interjects, the marquess decides to give her the beggar as a pet dog and pressures the man into behaving as such. By the end of the evening, the bride is whisked away (we won't see her again, but we're told she lives an unhappy life and dies early), and the beggar is taken to the dungeon, where his only friend is a mute girl whose father oversees the jail.

The marquess forgets all of this, and years pass. Eventually the girl grows up. When she refuses the marquess's advances, he has her thrown into the dungeon, which is where she's raped by the now-feral beggar. The next morning, the beggar's dead, and she's taken to see the marquess, who's quickly stabbed to death by her in one of the movie's few cathartic payoffs.

I covered the next part earlier - we're shown her taken care of until her son is born. She dies in childbirth, and the scholar and housekeeper raise her son, Leon, as their own. By the time he's a boy, his curse starts taking hold: there's an incident with some goats where he's shot but recovers because the bullet isn't silver. Meanwhile, the hunter who shot him (not realizing who he was), prepares a silver bullet that will come up later. His adopted parents turn to a priest, who confirms their werewolf suspicions and provides some hope: a woman who loves him may be able to save him.

The movie jumps ahead again, and Leon is now a young man. There haven't been any further "incidents," and he has no idea he's a werewolf. He leaves home to work at a vineyard, where he meets and falls in love with Cristina, the owner's daughter. The two make plans to run away together, but before that can happen Leon's curse reemerges when he's dragged to a disreputable establishment by a disreputable friend. Before the night's over, Leon has killed a woman trying to seduce him and that friend. The next morning his father finds him in bed. Leon has only vague dreams of the night before, but he realizes something horrible has occurred. His father takes him to the priest, who explains everything and offers to send him to a monastery.

Leon refuses and returns to the vineyard. Cristina watches over him the following night and - as foretold - her presence and love keep him human. Realizing the power she has, Leon convinces her to run away with him, but before they can leave he's arrested by the authorities, who have pieced together his involvement in the murders. Leon sends for his adopted father and tells him he needs to be put to death, as the prison bars won't be enough to hold him. His father tries explaining all this to mayor, and the priest renews his offer to have Leon sent to a monastery, where the curse can be controlled. The mayor, however, dismisses all this as nonsense and declares Leon must stand trial.

But of course it never comes to that. The moon causes Leon to transform and break out, killing another prisoner and the guard in the process. He's then chased through town by a mob wielding the usual torches, while his father (who's collected the silver bullet from earlier) follows Leon into a church and Old Yellers him.

The movie succeeds in selling the ending as tragic - you feel the weight of what happens, both because the movie's victims (Leon, his adopted parents, and Cristina) are innocent, and because it wasn't inevitable - a more understanding society could have solved this without bloodshed. More than that, the movie goes to lengths to demonstrate that this tragedy occurs because of the actions of the rich, as well as the indifference of that society. The real villains here are the marquess, along with his friends who enable him, the townsfolk who send the beggar to them as a joke, the mob who forces an impossible choice on Leon's adopted family.... From that point of view, the movie's themes are progressive and clever.

Unfortunately, that's not the only way to look at the subtext. From a literal reading Leon is innocent, but monsters really weren't intended to be considered literally. In context, it certainly seems like Leon's affliction is a representation of urges stereotypically associated with masculinity, namely lust and violence. The idea that a loving woman can tame these urges seems to imply it's a woman's job to do so; the real world equivalent brings to mind some of the worst aspects of the so-called "men's rights" movements and other misogynistic ideologies.

The attempted seduction by a woman coded as immoral that results in her death likewise comes across as an attempt to blame the victim (particularly because in context Leon suffers from killing her, implying he's somehow a victim of her actions). I can't say for certain whether this subtext was intended, but at best this failed to consider the implications of its story.

Again, depending on your inclination towards or away from this era and genre, you'll either love the film or find it a chore to sit through. The design and effects in the last act are really quite impressive for the era, particularly as the fully revealed wolf man climbs buildings and runs along ledges to escape and/or battle with angry villagers. Once it gets going, the movie does good work updating the classic Universal concept with modern (for 1961) techniques. It just takes its time getting to that point, devoting around half its runtime to multiple iterations of backstory. And I'm sure the subtext is going to be a deal-breaker for some viewers understandably disgusted by the insinuation a woman's love and devotion is the solution male violence. If you can look past that, the themes tracing tragedy to societal indifference and the cruelty of the wealthy have merit, but whether the movie deserves such benefit of the doubt is of course going be subjective.

I should note that the movie's disjointed structure feels like a consequence of a rushed shooting schedule. The film's set in Spain, a decision that seems to have been made based on set availability, rather than anything thematic or artistic. It wouldn't surprise me if some other aspects of the story were likewise cobbled together based on limited resources or the like - that intro bit really feels like it was tossed together on the fly to make use of what was handy (though, again, I thought it was tossed together well, for what it's worth).

I mostly had fun with this one despite its shortcomings. And the holiday connections, however brief, make for a refreshing deviation as the cause of lycanthropy (or one of the causes - the movie also implies the whole feral parentage was a factor). In short, this is a solid, beautifully shot monster movie with a lot of issues. If that sounds like a good time, you'll probably like this, as I did. If its sounds tedious, you should probably follow your instincts and stay away.