Face of the Screaming Werewolf

Face of the Screaming Werewolf
Directed by Gilberto Martínez Solares
Rafael Portillo
Jerry Warren
Produced by Jerry Warren
Written by Fernando de Fuentes
Gilberto Martínez Solares
Alfredo Salazar
Jerry Warren
Starring Lon Chaney Jr.
Yerye Beirute
George Mitchell
Fred Hoffman
Rosita Arenas
Ramón Gay
Music by Luis Hernández Bretón
Cinematography Raúl Martínez Solares
Enrique Wallace
Edited by Jerry Warren
Distributed by A.D.P. Pictures Inc.
Something Weird Video
Release date
  • 1965 (1965) (U.S.)
[1][2]
Running time
 60 minutes
Country Mexico
United States
Language English (Dubbed)

Face of the Screaming Werewolf is a 1965[3][2] horror film created by low budget film maker Jerry Warren by combining parts of two unrelated Mexican horror films (La Casa del Terror (1959) and La Momia Azteca (1957)), and adding new footage which he had shot himself.[4] It was released theatrically on a double-bill with Warren's similarly constructed Curse of the Stone Hand, which starred John Carradine.[2]

Warren eliminated almost all of the comedy scenes with Mexican comedian Tin-Tan from Casa del Terror[4] and combined the remaining Lon Chaney Jr. footage with mummy footage he took from La Momia Azteca.,[5]

Warren had earlier released his own re-edited version of La Momia Azteca in 1963, which he had retitled Attack of the Mayan Mummy, by removing huge chunks of the original foreign film and replacing them with newly filmed footage featuring American actors.[6] He later used extensive footage from this same Mexican mummy film to incorporate into his Face of the Screaming Werewolf.[4]

Plot

A psychic woman named Ann Taylor (Rosita Arenas),[7] regressed to a former life via hypnosis, leads archaeologists into an Aztec pyramid where they discover a tomb containing two mummies, one of which turns out to be a mummified Caucasian werewolf (Lon Chaney Jr.), the other a mummified ancient Aztec warrior (Angel di Stefani). A mad doctor (Yerye Beirute)[7] kidnaps the werewolf-mummy to his lab and manages to revive him, the unwrapped creature transforming into a snarling werewolf when the full moon rises.

The werewolf kills the mad scientist, escapes from the lab and goes on a killing spree in a nearby city. The werewolf kidnaps a young woman (Yolanda Varela) from her apartment near the film's finale, and Mexican comedian Tin-Tan (German Valdes) shows up out of nowhere to attempt to rescue her (since almost all of his scenes had been edited out of the original Mexican film by Jerry Warren for this Americanized edition[4]) and he battles the monster to the death on a building ledge high above the city.

Meanwhile, the second mummy (the Aztec warrior) escapes from captivity later that night and tries to kidnap Ann Taylor, the psychic, from her apartment, but they are both anticlimactically hit by a car and killed (off-screen) as he tries to carry her off. A hastily inserted newspaper headline alerts the public that the Mummy has been killed, bringing the film to an abrupt end.

Cast

  • Lon Chaney Jr. as The Mummified Werewolf
  • Angel Di Stefani as The Aztec Mummy
  • Rosita Arenas as Ann Taylor (the psychic)
  • Yerye Beirute as Dr. Janning
  • George Mitchell as Dr. Frederick Munson
  • Fred Hoffman as Detective Hammond
  • Ramón Gay (billed as Raymond Gaylord) as Dr. Edmund Redding
  • Alfredo W. Barron (billed as Donald Barron) as Janning's heavyset henchman
  • Yolanda Varela (billed as Landa Varle) as the girl carried off by the werewolf
  • German Valdes (aka Tin-Tan) as Hero who rescues the girl from the werewolf
  • Chuck Niles as newscaster Douglas Banks
  • Steve Conte as The Hired Thief

Critical Responses

Michael Weldon of Psychotronic Video stated that the film did not make sense since so much of the original dialogue scenes had been removed.[8] Cavett Binion of AllMovie referred to it as a "messy film" that contained poor dubbing and editing.[9]

References

  1. ↑ Weldon, Michael (1996). "The Psychotronic Video Guide". St. Martin's Griffin. ISBN 0-312-13149-6. Page 195
  2. 1 2 3 Smith 2006, p. 148.
  3. ↑ Weldon, Michael (1996). "The Psychotronic Video Guide". St.Martin's Griffin. ISBN 0-312-13149-6. Page 195
  4. 1 2 3 4 Cotter 2005, p. 41.
  5. ↑ Smith 2006, p. 147.
  6. ↑ Ray, Fred Olen (1991). "The New Poverty Row". McFarland and Co. Inc. ISBN 0-89950-628-3. Page 14, 15
  7. 1 2 Cotter 2005, p. 40.
  8. ↑ Weldon, Michael (1996). "The Psychotronic Video Guide". St.Martin's Griffin. ISBN 0-312-13149-6. Page 195
  9. ↑ Binion, Cavett. "Face of the Screaming Werewolf". Retrieved 9 July 2018.

Sources

  • Cotter, Robert Michael (2005). The Mexican Masked Wrestler and Monster Filmography. McFarland. ISBN 0-7864-2022-7.
  • Smith, Don G. (1996). Lon Chaney Jr. McFarland. ISBN 0-7864-0120-6.


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