HOWLING V: THE REBIRTH
UK, 1989, 96 minutes, Colour.
Phil Davis, Victoria Catlin, Ben Cole, William Shockley, Mark Sivertsen, Stephanie Faulkner, Mary Stavin, Clive Turner, Nigel Triffit, Jill Pearson.
Directed by Neal Sundstrom.
This is the fifth film in a series based on novels by author, Gary Brandner. The first, The Howling, was released in 1984. Several sequels were produced quickly in succeeding years with a range of directors, including Australian Philippe Mora for Howling II and III.
While this is a film about wolves, they appear explicitly only in the prologue to the film, set in the 15th century, a Castle in Hungary, a massacre, her husband and wife trying to rid the Castle of the curse of the werewolves, murder-suicide – but the realisation that a baby with the werewolf gene has survived.
In the 20th century, account, played by a rather young Phil Davis, wants to get rid of the descendant with the werewolf gene and carefully assembles a group who have a tattoo on their arm and are descendants of the werewolf baby. However, he does not know which has the gene.
So, basically, they all arrive at the Castle, the film turns into something of a haunted house theme with a gradually diminishing cast until the suspect with the gene is exposed and does a final killing as the final credits come up.
The cast is not well known at all and some of the performances are far from convincing. There is some tension, Phil Davis behaving like a latter-day Count Dracula (which he isn’t). So, a motley group, getting lost in the underground coroners of the Castle, squabbles, various deaths, and a final confrontation.
