“After teasing his friends for believing in werewolves, Larry (Lon Chaney Jr.) is promptly bitten by a rabid wolf and faints. Horror superstars share the screen when Larry wakes to find a gypsy (Bela Lugosi) who moonlights as a werewolf. Cursed by the werewolf’s bite, Larry suffers torturous full-moon transformations and tries to escape the townsfolk who hunt him. Claude Rains, Evelyn Ankers and Ralph Bellamy also grace this classic B movie.”
2010’s remake followed the framework of the 1941 original, but just added a bunch of pageantry and more bodies. In my view the original comes out ahead: the visuals are strikingly beautiful and antiquated – rather than forced. The performances are sincere. Lon Chaney’s Lawrence Stewart Talbot seems like a pretty good bloke (when he’s not peeping through windows at unsuspecting women, wtf) overcome by something he couldn’t possibly have predicted.
Also, Bela Lugosi is in the film being all gypsy and mysterious and silly.
The Wolf Man is available to watch online via Amazon Instant Video, Google Play Movies, and YouTube. If you’d like to watch with us, queue up the movie as follows: sometime before 7 PM PST Tuesday the 22nd play the first few moments. The old (and beautiful) logo for “A Universal Picture” will appear. The moment it fades off the screen, pause the movie. At 7 PM PST exactly, resume the film. Then follow on Twitter at @BmovieBFFs or post to/enable Notifications on the Facebook thread as we watch this B-movie classic!
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