Director: Terence Fisher
Writers: Anthony Hinds, Guy Endore
Stars: Clifford Evans, Oliver Reed, Yvonne Romain
1 Hour, 33 minutes
Synopsis
This one takes place in Spain two hundred years ago. A beggar comes to town and wonders why the church bells are all ringing and the streets are deserted. The Marquis is getting married today, and everything is closed. The beggar goes to the castle, hoping for some charity from the wedding party.
The Marquis is a bully who likes to pick on and humiliate the servants, so there was no way that was going to end well. After a humiliating torment, he’s locked in the dungeon for decades. The only person he knows is the jailer and his daughter, a mute girl.
The Marquis gets annoyed with the girl and he throws her in the dungeon with the long-forgotten beggar. The beggar has long since gone insane, and he rapes her. She goes to see the Marquis again, and when he tries to rape her, she stabs him to death and runs off.
Don Alfredo finds her unconscious in the woods and takes her home. The girl is now pregnant. The servant points out to Alfredo that the girl is going to have her baby on Christmas Day, which is a bad omen and an insult to Heaven.
The baby is born at just the wrong time, but the mother soon dies. When it’s time to be baptized, the pool of holy water boils. Several years later, Pepe, a hunter, finds dead animals on the grounds. He waits until that night and shoots when he hears the howling of a wolf. Just coincidentally, little boy Leon, Alfredo’s ward has a bullet in his knee the next morning. Alfredo and Teresa figure out what’s what. Leon dreams that he’s a wolf, drinking blood and he’s got hairy palms.
The priest thinks Leon is a werewolf, and he advises Alfredo to take care. The priest says that Leon may be cured by finding a good woman who loves him. Alfredo installs bars on the boy’s windows so he can’t get out again. Pepe the hunter knows he hit the creature in the woods, so he makes a silver bullet. The bars keep Leon inside, so the hunter never uses that bullet. Instead, he shoots at a dog while Leon fights to get through the bars.
Leon grows up and goes to town for work. He finds a place at the local vineyard. He meets the boss’s daughter, and he likes her. He and his coworker go out to celebrate on Saturday, and it just happens to be a full moon. Leon feels strange and leaves the party. He kills the girl he’s with and also his coworker, and then he runs off and kills a farmer the same night.
Alfredo finds Leon back in his bedroom, and the bars on the window are broken inwards. He knows what happened. Alfredo, Teresa, and the priest explain everything to Leon, as it’s time for him to learn the truth. Leon has a grown-up temper tantrum when he runs off.
That night, he starts to turn again, when Cristina, the boss’s daughter, comes in. She stays with him, and he doesn’t change. She held the creature at bay. He and Cristina make plans to run off and get married since she can keep him under control. Unfortunately, the police arrest Leon for the murders.
Leon wants Alfredo to ask the judge to execute him. They go see the mayor and tell him everything. Leon, Cristina, Alfredo, the priest, and the mayor all meet at the jail. Things go badly, and Leon reminds Alfredo that Pepe has a silver bullet.
That evening, the moon rises and Leon breaks out of jail. Leon climbs up on the roof and the rest of the city chases him. Alfredo gets the silver bullet and shoots Leon, killing him.
Commentary
I seem to remember Hammer films being low budget and cheap-looking, but this certainly was not. The sets alone in this one are impressive, and it was actually filmed in Spain. This is also Hammer’s only werewolf movie, which is odd, but also very much worth watching.
Oliver Reed doesn’t show up until 48 minutes into the film, but he’s very good in the last half of the story. I’ve seen this one half a dozen times, and I’m still not decided whether the werewolf makeup is really good or really bad, but Leon is a very distinctive-looking werewolf, more like the Wolf Man than a modern “superdog” werewolf.