Howling IV: The Original Nightmare (1988)

Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

I got this movie in a 8 movie package. The first movie The Prophecy with Christopher Walken was horrible. This movie Barfing IV is worse.Here's the problem: The story sucks. Apparently this is closer to the book than the first Howling. I saw the first movie many years ago, and don't remember it as being this horrible. The script, the dialogue, the stupid non-important, non-consequential scenes. It's so incredibly boring. The acting is horrible all around. You could tell Romy Windsor, the main female actress is trying. But trying does not mean you should be in front of the camera. Maybe as a model. Not as an actress. All the rest of the cast sucks completely. The worst actor here is the husband. Again, he is no actor. Maybe as a clothing model. This guy has zero acting talent. The wife's boyfriend. He was slightly better than the husband, but what the hell was his story line in the movie. The former nun, acting is whatever. How does she go from being a nun to a civilian and all of a sudden she has a car, fancy clothes and can stay in hotels? Where did she get the money for all that? This movie is consistently bad all around. The camera work sucks. The editing is whatever. Best part is when that couple gets killed by the water halfway through the movie. And guess what, they screw that up too with some completely inappropriate music. I mean this thing has to be seen to be believed. There are scenes where the husband and wife are in the cabin talking about some stupidity. The camera angle is like, OK, we got the shot, roll the film. Nothing special going on. Conversation is not moving the film forward. We don't get to see any wherewolfs, or wolfmen, or whatever the hell they are until the last 10 minutes. The worst transformation scene ever! Worst, and ugliest costumes and that includes the human wardrobe. Take a look at that double button down vest on the doctor. This is one stupid and ugly movie. Sets suck, take a look at that town and the cabin. Crappy music, crappy dialogue, crappy non acting, no chemistry, no packing, no atmosphere, no surprises, no nothing.If you can bare to watch this it would be a test in discipline and endurance. It took me two sittings. I have read most of the user reviews and some of the critic reviews. And You Call Yourself a Scientist! critic reviews was most entertaining to read as they give a very good account of this mess of a movie. There should be a book written about this movie. Screen for screen description of how not to make a movie, and what is wrong with each scene, and an overall serious takedown of the screenplay and the movie overall. Now, that would be entertaining. Then they should produce a remix of this movie with 50's TV laugh tracks. Then we are in the realm of full blown entertainment.As it stands, this thing is garbage. No value at all. It is not so bad it's good. It is not so bad it's bad. It is so bad, you fall asleep. I still believe Suspiria is the worst movie ever, simply because a lot of people actually love it. Which is inconceivable. But, there is room at the bottom for Howling IV.Complete Failure! F, 1 star. One thing it does do, it elevates other crappy movies like Star Wars Force Awakens to entertainment level.

The only flaw I want to emphasize is that the early scenes in this film, much like the opening credits, are too quick to be effective. This one (however) is more faithful to the novel than the original, and once you get past the first 15 minutes, it doesn't seem so rushed. Romy Windsor plays the vision-bound, introverted, semi-tolerated Marie. Neither Marie, nor her husband Richard, nor their friend Tom, believe in werewolves. Janice, an ex-nun, is the only one considering a werewolf-existence possibility. Marie/Richard met her in Drago, and Janice's belief in demons is probably what paved the way for her werewolf suspicions. Along the way, some peeps have vanished, including a hitch-hiking couple and the long-dead sister Ruth. When Marie discovers that the sheriff covered-up the disappearance of the pleasant hitch-hiking couple, or attempted to do so, tempers flare. There's more than one way to skin a wolf (or cover it's tracks), and it isn't by lying to red-riding hood. You can't run a successful werewolf business without breaking a few nuns, as it turns out. The lethargic and apathetic sheriff would probably agree. The main complaint here is the scarce on-screen werewolf time. But in my opinion, this is redeemed by acceptable performances, just enough atmosphere, and a classic 80's score.

I actually think this sequel is a improvement from the last two Movies in the series .This movie is actually a lot different compared to the others and it's again a stand alone movie that its own storyThere was not much werewolf acation until about hour into the movie , the last half hour of the movie.The most of the movie is about this girl who writer , who seeing ghost and things now and again thought the movie ,, she either seeing things that have happened in the past in cabin., which makes thinks she going crazy , seeing thing that not really there.so the movie still had odd things happen until so- what action packed last 30 mins of the movie, , when we do see the first werewolf scene , I was torn as I thought , that was a bit out of the blue but I was gutted that we did not get to see the transformation part .I loved that melting scene , I thought that was amazing, those effect we're perfect for that scene The acting from cast was really good , much better then the wooden actor in the last sequel Im going to give this 4,8 , I just rounded of to 5 out of 10 ,

Haunted by a series of unnatural happenings, a young author, Marie Adams heads for the sanctuary of a rural hideout in a desperate bid to regain her sanity - but only to find a horror much more deadly than her own deranged imaginings. From the depths of the forest it's calling and waiting for the full moon, to hunt Marie down and to take her on a terrifying journey into the gaping jaws of death. As night descends, the howling rises again to shatter the stillness of the night.This film starred: Romy Windsor, Michael T. Weiss & Anthony Hamilton.I have seen the first 4 howling films and this is my favourite one although I still don't like it. In my opinion best to worst is like this (so far as I have not seen some of the sequels)...Howling 4 Howling Howling 3 Howling 2This film is not really recommended.**/***** Poor.