Werewolf in a Girls' Dormitory (Severin Films Blu-ray Review)

Is Werewolf in a Girls’ Dormitory Trash or Treasure?

Blu-ray Distributed By: Severin Films / October 29, 2019

Twisted Italian horror meets lurid German krimi in the 1961 EuroShocker filled with “genuinely eerie scenes and rather graphic maulings” (DVD Drive-In), now restored like you’ve never seen or heard it before: When an all-girl reform school is rocked by a series of grisly murders, it will unleash a nightmare of sexual corruption and lupine depravity. Carl Schell (The Blue Max), Barbara Lass (aka Roman Polanski’s first wife Barbara Kwiatkowska) and Luciano Pigozzi (Castle of The Living Dead) star in this infamous Italian/Austrian co-production – originally titled LYCANTHROPUS– directed by Paolo Heusch (The Day The Sky Exploded) from a screenplay by giallo maestro Ernesto Gastaldi (All The Colors of The Dark) with a classic score by Armando Trovajoli (Strange Shadows In An Empty Room), newly scanned in 2k from archival elements recently discovered in a Rome lab vault.

Jimbo’s Take (3.5 / 5)

Unless you just collect everything Severin Films releases on blu-ray, you might not even give Werewolf in a Girls’ Dormitory a passing glance. It’s easy to overlook, especially for dumb Americans. It has a silly title (the original title ‘Lycanthropus‘ isn’t much better), it’s black and white, and it’s Italian (which means reading subtitles or listening to an English dub)… But if you can get passed all of those personal biases, you might be pleasantly surprised by Werewolf in a Girls’ Dormitory, as was I.

Think Lon Chaney Jr’s 1941 classic The Wolf Man with a giallo-style, murder-mystery sensibility. Unlike The Wolf Man this movie isn’t a character study of a person’s descent into becoming a monster. Instead the movie is littered with characters, all of whom have hidden secrets and sins just waiting to be exposed. Like Twin Peaks but in 1961, and with a werewolf.

Ernesto Gastaldi’s script is surprisingly dense. There’s a doctor running away from a hidden past. A wealthy, local figurehead is having an affair with one of the reformatory girls. And of course there is a series of strange murders by a wolf-man-like creature. It’s a well crafted who-dun-it that had me guessing til the very end.

And I found Werewolf in a Girls’ Dormitory surprisingly violent and grisly for a 1961 movie. Paolo Heusch (credited as Richard Benson) crafts several sincere moments of tension. Now, I don’t want to oversell it. It still feels quaint by today’s expectations and standards, but it’s just spooky and grisly enough that I won’t be showing it to my kiddos. And they’ve seen a majority of the Universal monster classics.

I’ll admit, going into Werewolf in a Girls’ Dormitory I had my own preconceptions. I was fully expecting a blatant rip-off of a movie like The Wolf Man (1941), or something goofier like I Was A Teenage Werewolf (1957). But instead we get a nice blended mystery that just-so-happens to include a werewolf.

The Tech Stuff (3 / 5)

Severin Films has boasted their blu-ray of Werewolf in a Girls’ Dormitory as ‘newly scanned in 2k from archival elements recently discovered in a Rome lab vault’. Although the image is fine, it won’t impress. Or at least it won’t compared to the inflated standards we’ve come to expect. Blacks don’t quite get as deep or dense as we expect. Contrast isn’t that great, and there are slight fluctuations in quality probably due to mismatched elements.

Audio comes in two forms. You have the choice of listening to a stereo Italian language track with English subtitles. Or you can listen to the English dub. I watched the entire movie with the English dub, which again is good but not great. I did sample the Italian track which seemed louder with more pronounced ambient noises and background hissing. In time, I’m sure I’ll go back and watch the whole thing again in Italian.

All in all, there’s nothing to brag about technically but the video/audio presentation does meet the standard of the format. And (to be fair) Severin has given us something leaps and bounds better than what’s come before!

Extras (4 / 5)

And here we are once again…the main reason to buy this blu-ray. I say this a lot on my write-ups, but it continues to be true for these oddball movies. This Severin Films blu-ray has three main reasons to buy: 1) the audio commentary, 2) the interview with the screenwriter, Ernesto Gastaldi, and 3) the bonus CD soundtrack.

The audio commentary is really good because it has a nice balance between actor Curt Lowens’ memories as they happen on screen real time, and film historian David Del Valle’s tendency to push a deeper dive into film history connections with Werewolf in a Girls’ Dormitory.

The brief featurette ‘Bad Moon Rising’ is a nice interview segment with the screenwriter offering an alternate glimpse into the movie’s origins. And the trailers are fun to see just how different the marketing was between US and Italian audiences. For the record, the Italian trailer more accurately represents the film’s tone.

Audio Commentary with Actor Curt Lowens, Moderated by David Del Valle
Bad Moon Rising: Interview with Screenwriter Ernesto Gastaldi
Alternate Opening
US & Italian Trailers
Booklet Insert
BONUS: CD Soundtrack

Trash or Treasure? Overall Recommendation

If you don’t have Werewolf in a Girls’ Dormitory you won’t know what you’re missing. It’s not must-see movie making or anything profound, but it is a decent little thriller with good directing and capable performances. As of writing this review, you can watch it on Amazon Prime with subscription. However, Amazon’s stream is the truncated US cut with poor quality video. If you want to see the uncut version with Severin’s great special features and commentary track, owning the blu-ray is the way to go.