AAWIL is a modern day setting of a hoary old horror cliché. Man gets bitten by werewolf, becomes a werewolf himself and then goes on the rampage etc. All this is familiar stuff, done to death many times, but here we have the addition of a strain of darkly morbid comedy, represented by the regular appearances of Jack in increasing degrees of decay throughout the film. This raises the film above the average, but it does not save it from the boring musical montages (there are 3 of them!) or the frequent gimmicky nightmare sequences (too many to mention) which pad out the middle portion of the film.
The film starts well on the Yorkshire Moors, with the local inhabitants of a village pub (the wonderfully named "Slaughtered Lamb") playing the part of ignorant and fearful villagers in films we have seen made many times. Then David is bitten and Jack is killed by the werewolf and then David wakes inexplicably in London (why? Are there no hospitals in Yorkshire?) Nurse Alex takes a liking to Jack and gives him a treatment beyond that usually available on the NHS. (It is not standard practise for English nurses to watch over patients at night or read them to sleep with stories but Americans seem to romanticise much about the NHS). There is some laboured comedy involving 2 detectives investigating the case. Then the padding nightmare scenes start. First David running naked and killing animals, then one involving his family being killed by masked Nazis(huh? what relevance does this have?) from which he awakens to see Alex being killed by another masked Nazi -but this turns out to be just another dream. This is such a cheat that I almost feel like giving it a 1 rating just for that.
Things perk up with the re-appearance of Jack. Then Alex whisks David to her flat. This brings about the first montage, a love making scene to "Moondance". Soon we will get "bad moon rising" in a rather pointless montage quickly followed by "Blue Moon" during the actual transformation scene. This transformation is very impressive.
Eventually David goes to a porno cinema to meet Jack again, who is now very decomposed. This scene, we the appearance of a host of people who David has killed, demanding he kill himself is the comedy highlight of the film.
The final climax is overblown but the effect is rather ordinary.
The film starts well on the Yorkshire Moors, with the local inhabitants of a village pub (the wonderfully named "Slaughtered Lamb") playing the part of ignorant and fearful villagers in films we have seen made many times. Then David is bitten and Jack is killed by the werewolf and then David wakes inexplicably in London (why? Are there no hospitals in Yorkshire?) Nurse Alex takes a liking to Jack and gives him a treatment beyond that usually available on the NHS. (It is not standard practise for English nurses to watch over patients at night or read them to sleep with stories but Americans seem to romanticise much about the NHS). There is some laboured comedy involving 2 detectives investigating the case. Then the padding nightmare scenes start. First David running naked and killing animals, then one involving his family being killed by masked Nazis(huh? what relevance does this have?) from which he awakens to see Alex being killed by another masked Nazi -but this turns out to be just another dream. This is such a cheat that I almost feel like giving it a 1 rating just for that.
Things perk up with the re-appearance of Jack. Then Alex whisks David to her flat. This brings about the first montage, a love making scene to "Moondance". Soon we will get "bad moon rising" in a rather pointless montage quickly followed by "Blue Moon" during the actual transformation scene. This transformation is very impressive.
Eventually David goes to a porno cinema to meet Jack again, who is now very decomposed. This scene, we the appearance of a host of people who David has killed, demanding he kill himself is the comedy highlight of the film.
The final climax is overblown but the effect is rather ordinary.