I Was a Teenage WerewolfBeing out of control makes you into a monster. I Was a Teenage Werewolf is a vintage monster movie about a troubled high school student named Tony (Michael Landon), whose quick temper threatens to get him into real trouble with the likes of the kindly Detective Donovan (Barney Phillips). Tony eventually takes up the advise of Donovan and his understanding girlfriend, Arlene (Yvonne Lime), and goes for treatment from a psychologist named Dr. Alfred Brandon (Whit Bissell). But Dr. Brandon's nefarious plan to regress Tony into a primal state unleashes a real monster within him.
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I Was a Teenage Werewolf begins with a ferocious brawl between Tony and the bigger Jimmy (Tony Marshall); despite the obvious size advantage, Tony fights like a cornered wolverine, and also fights dirty and with makeshift weapons like a shovel. The minuscule impetus behind this deadly throwdown is as alarming as the fact that Jimmy and Tony are "friends", who hang out at the abandoned "haunted house" for parties with their respective girlfriends. Tony's impulses identify him as a tormented young man who is suffering not just from the raging hormones of puberty, but a deeper psychological curse. When he and Arlene go to a Halloween party, the festivities are in general good spirits, with everyone playing innocent enough pranks on one another; even Tony gets in on it by splashing his buddy, Vic (Kenny Miller), with a bucket of water. This buildup makes it all the more jarring when Vic returns the favor, and Tony completely loses control and assaults him, leaving all of his friends and Arlene in a state of absolute shock. It is suggested that Tony's moodiness and withdrawn attitude is due in part to his inability to cope with the loss of his mother, leaving his father, Charles (Malcolm Atterbury), working the night shift to support them both in their tiny house. Tony also seems to resent the rest of his friends--even Arlene--for having more emotionally and financially stable lives, evidenced when he lips off to Arlene's dad, who provokes Tony by condescending to him. Tony comments that he doesn't like to be touched, and his refusal to heed the warnings given to him by Donovan and his father make him seem reckless. An alternative interpretation of I Was a Teenage Werewolf suggests that despite the horrible experiments performed on him by Dr. Brandon, Tony is actually suffering from a psychological affliction like bipolar disorder.
Tony's transformation into a violent monster is a metaphor for the manic phase that is triggered when he is stimulated, be it by anger, surprise, or arousal. The most well-known scene in I Was a Teenage Werewolf has Tony walking into the gymnasium to see his attractive friend, Theresa (Dawn Richard), performing gymnastics by herself in her form-fitting leotard. He silently observes her from the corner of the gym; when the school bell rings--practically right next to his ear--the combination of sexual enticement and shock triggers his vivid transformation into the long-toothed terror that had previously remained unseen in the film. The first killing happens in the woods around Rockdale to his lonely friend, Frank (Michael Rougas), and film withholds revealing what slew the boy, saving the lurid reveal until later. Police photographs tell the investigators that something with "fangs" killed the young man, and when the police janitor, Pepe (Vladimir Sokoloff), glimpses the photos, he gives the audience its exposition about the legend of the werewolf from the "old country" in the Carpathian Mountains. In combination with the chemical and hypnotic triggers by Dr. Brandon, Tony's pent up aggression after his cold and sullen goodbye to Arlene after the party--either from sexual frustration or having not been in a fight in a while--awakened his bloodlust. When Tony regains consciousness and transforms back into a human being, he recalls his deadly rages as though they were nightmares; he knows that he was responsible deep down, and that guilt only compounds the problem.
Despite being the antagonist in I Was a Teenage Werewolf, Dr. Brandon is a psychologically complex figure for a cheap teen monster flick made over the course of a week--consider how much Dr. Brandon's office looks Principal Ferguson's (Louise Lewis). Dr. Brandon fits the bill as a mad scientist; he is determined to transform Tony into a subhuman creature by "regressing" him to a primal state. Yet he tells his assistant, Dr. Hugo Wagner (Joseph Mell), that his intent is to stem the tide of humanity's destructive urges by essentially resetting the clock of civilization. This is, of course, complete hokum and a paper thin justification to disguise his true intent: scientific acclaim and exploiting his profession to play God. Dr. Brandon is a clear sociopath, and not just in his misguided approach to medicine. He berates Dr. Wagner by saying he doesn't have the stomach for doing what is necessary to achieve a "scientific triumph". Dr. Brandon treats ethics as an obstacle; he outright lies to his patient about his hypnotherapy and administers drugs to him without his consent. He also shows no interest in treating the very real psychological demons haunting Tony, and fabricates progress reports to share with Principal Ferguson. He justifies his abuse of Tony and his doctor/patient privilege by claiming that Tony's anger issues would have landed him in prison or worse anyway, so there's no real harm in experimenting on him. He often refers to the people he uses as "guinea pigs"--implying that there were others before Tony--because to Dr. Brandon, their lives don't really mean anything. He lies with a straight face with ease, like when Donovan comes to interrogate him after Tony's reveal as a werewolf, and squirms at the suggestion that he would stoop to be involved with anything unscientific--like the "fantasy" of a werewolf. Pay attention to Dr. Brandon in this scene and the way that he grips a letter opener. His defensiveness speaks to a variety of psychological complexes buried within the "head shrink" himself, and recalls the infamous picture of J. P. Morgan by Edward Steichen. I Was a Teenage Werewolf follows a lot of monster movie cliches in its set up and resolution, yet the tragic dynamic between an immoral doctor and a truly troubled patient adds a level of complexity to this B-movie cult classic.
Recommended for: Fans of a campy monster flick that made a star out of Michael Landon and led to the popularization of the "I Was a Teenage..." series of knock-off movies and jokes about the absurd title. Despite this, I Was a Teenage Werewolf has a layer of subtext about the perils of misunderstood--or misdiagnosed--mental health issues that gives it value beyond just being a cheesy creature feature.
Tony's transformation into a violent monster is a metaphor for the manic phase that is triggered when he is stimulated, be it by anger, surprise, or arousal. The most well-known scene in I Was a Teenage Werewolf has Tony walking into the gymnasium to see his attractive friend, Theresa (Dawn Richard), performing gymnastics by herself in her form-fitting leotard. He silently observes her from the corner of the gym; when the school bell rings--practically right next to his ear--the combination of sexual enticement and shock triggers his vivid transformation into the long-toothed terror that had previously remained unseen in the film. The first killing happens in the woods around Rockdale to his lonely friend, Frank (Michael Rougas), and film withholds revealing what slew the boy, saving the lurid reveal until later. Police photographs tell the investigators that something with "fangs" killed the young man, and when the police janitor, Pepe (Vladimir Sokoloff), glimpses the photos, he gives the audience its exposition about the legend of the werewolf from the "old country" in the Carpathian Mountains. In combination with the chemical and hypnotic triggers by Dr. Brandon, Tony's pent up aggression after his cold and sullen goodbye to Arlene after the party--either from sexual frustration or having not been in a fight in a while--awakened his bloodlust. When Tony regains consciousness and transforms back into a human being, he recalls his deadly rages as though they were nightmares; he knows that he was responsible deep down, and that guilt only compounds the problem.
Despite being the antagonist in I Was a Teenage Werewolf, Dr. Brandon is a psychologically complex figure for a cheap teen monster flick made over the course of a week--consider how much Dr. Brandon's office looks Principal Ferguson's (Louise Lewis). Dr. Brandon fits the bill as a mad scientist; he is determined to transform Tony into a subhuman creature by "regressing" him to a primal state. Yet he tells his assistant, Dr. Hugo Wagner (Joseph Mell), that his intent is to stem the tide of humanity's destructive urges by essentially resetting the clock of civilization. This is, of course, complete hokum and a paper thin justification to disguise his true intent: scientific acclaim and exploiting his profession to play God. Dr. Brandon is a clear sociopath, and not just in his misguided approach to medicine. He berates Dr. Wagner by saying he doesn't have the stomach for doing what is necessary to achieve a "scientific triumph". Dr. Brandon treats ethics as an obstacle; he outright lies to his patient about his hypnotherapy and administers drugs to him without his consent. He also shows no interest in treating the very real psychological demons haunting Tony, and fabricates progress reports to share with Principal Ferguson. He justifies his abuse of Tony and his doctor/patient privilege by claiming that Tony's anger issues would have landed him in prison or worse anyway, so there's no real harm in experimenting on him. He often refers to the people he uses as "guinea pigs"--implying that there were others before Tony--because to Dr. Brandon, their lives don't really mean anything. He lies with a straight face with ease, like when Donovan comes to interrogate him after Tony's reveal as a werewolf, and squirms at the suggestion that he would stoop to be involved with anything unscientific--like the "fantasy" of a werewolf. Pay attention to Dr. Brandon in this scene and the way that he grips a letter opener. His defensiveness speaks to a variety of psychological complexes buried within the "head shrink" himself, and recalls the infamous picture of J. P. Morgan by Edward Steichen. I Was a Teenage Werewolf follows a lot of monster movie cliches in its set up and resolution, yet the tragic dynamic between an immoral doctor and a truly troubled patient adds a level of complexity to this B-movie cult classic.
Recommended for: Fans of a campy monster flick that made a star out of Michael Landon and led to the popularization of the "I Was a Teenage..." series of knock-off movies and jokes about the absurd title. Despite this, I Was a Teenage Werewolf has a layer of subtext about the perils of misunderstood--or misdiagnosed--mental health issues that gives it value beyond just being a cheesy creature feature.