hy, one might well ask, is there a smiley face on the disk inside the CD case rather than a nice scary werewolf image? After all, this is one of two movies (An American Werewolf in London being the other) the helped redefine the werewolf genre during the 1980s. The answer is—it relates to the movie. Still: a smiley face? *Sigh.* But remove the disk, and behind it is a great nightmarish shot of Robert Picardo in mid-transformation, looking like he's having a ripping good time.
Composer Pino Donaggio first worked with director Joe Dante on the excellent Piranha in 1978. That film, like this one, was scripted by John Sayles, which is another reason why The Howling is a cut above. (This is also the movie with the famous line "Silver bullets or fire, that's the only way to get rid of the damn things. They're worse than cockroaches.") Donaggio has become widely known for his horror scores, including Carrie and Dressed to Kill. (All right, all right, so the latter isn't exactly a horror movie. Just chill.)
The Howling's cues are mostly pretty short. "End Title" is by far the longest, at 4:26. Brevity is a virtue here, generally, because a lot of this stuff is a little over the top, with portentous use of brass and high whining strings punctuated by chords at slow, chime-like intervals. The opening track—"Opening Title/Phone Call/Dark Streets"—is pretty much what one would expect, even to the wolf howl.
One thing that either helps or hinders the mood of the soundtrack is Donaggio's use of a massive church organ that he apparently happened on somewhere in Italy, where the score was largely recorded. It has an undeniably gorgeous sound, but at times, along with the hysterical strings, it's just a bit too much. As the liner notes say, "Long sustained notes draw out the suspense, while ominous brass sounds are used to herald the arrival of the lycanthropes. Adding to the eerie and chilling atmosphere are gothic organ, dreamlike chimes and human voices." Well, maybe.
A little long in the tooth
In the booklet, Donaggio describes how because of budgetary limitations he couldn't record a full orchestra together. Instead, he says, he "wrote cues for strings only and then cues for brass and woodwind which were meant to be intermingled together, and though such strategy doesn't sound like much nowadays, it was certainly very futuristic at the time." Well—again—maybe. Perhaps it's a case of the technology of the day not being up to the concept. In any event, the music here often sounds a bit thin, even though it's been remastered for this CD release.
It can't be denied that overall Donaggio does a good job. That said, the score hasn't really stood the test of time all that well (Donaggio's legion of fans may not agree), despite the use of a nice two-note motif here and there, as well as some interesting legato passages in cues like "Dark Streets." He occasionally abandons the use of "classical" instruments for synths, bass guitar and drums, as in "Hunting for Shadows."
The Howling was Pino Donaggio's seventh English-language feature-film score, after Don't Look Now, Tourist Trap, Home Movies and the aforementioned Carrie, Piranha and Dressed to Kill. His main influence was obviously Bernard Herrmann, though he formulated his own unique thematic constructions. The Howling isn't exactly a classic of its type, but it's well worth at least one listen.
The CD's running time is rather short, so to pad it out a bit, La La Land has included a few minutes of short monophonic "bonus" tracks and electronic sound effects, thoughtfully placed at the end of the CD so they are easily avoided if your tolerance for such things is low, as is mine. One of them ("Channel 6 Update") is the theme for the news program for which Wallace-Stone's character reports, which is a cute idea.
The booklet accompanying the disk has a lot of info packed into it and some good stills from the film, including the one that everyone remembers, of Dee Wallace-Stone with the gold contact lenses.
— Al
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