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Released by: Alchemy Entertainment
Released on: January 12th, 2016.
Director: Paul Hyett
Cast: Ed Speelers, Sean Pertwee, Shauna McDonald, Elliot Cowan
Year: 2015
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The Movie:
Horror movies are often formulaic, there's no getting around that, but sometimes a formula works. Take a group of people from different backgrounds, put them in an isolated location far from help and send in a threat? It works. It worked in Night Of The Living Dead, it worked in The Thing and, for the most part, it works in Paul Hyett's Howl.
The movie doesn't take place in a farm house or in an arctic research station but instead aboard a train, the last train leaving London on a typically dark and stormy night. Things are going fine until that train runs over… something. The driver (Sean Pertwee) gets out to see what happened and is promptly gutted by a large, hairy beast.
Meanwhile, inside the train, ticket taker Joe (Ed Speelers) and his pretty co-worker Ellen (Holly Weston) tend to the different passengers inside - an elderly couple named Ged (Duncan Preston) and Jenny (Ania Marson), an obnoxious cell-phone obsessed teenaged girl named Nina (Rosie Day), a student named Billy (Sam Gittins), a quiet Indian man named Matthew (Amit Shaw), a single mother named Kate (Shauna MacDonald), and a belligerent footballer named Paul (Calvin Dean). Oh, and there's an arrogant misogynist businessman named Adrian (Elliott Cowan) on board as well.
Of course, with the driver dead and the train leaking fuel, nobody is going anywhere unless they do it on foot. Against Joe's better judgement, they do just that but quickly come to the realization that there is a rather fierce werewolves in the area and quickly head back to the train. It might not be moving, but it will at least provide some shelter and possibly a way to defend themselves. As the night moves on, some of our characters will work together will some will try to do things their own way but all the while they're being hunted…
The second feature film from director Paul Hyett (probably best known for his SFX work on The Descent), Howl is a solid follow up to his debut picture, The Seasoning House. Like that earlier film, it's a violent picture but aside from some admittedly pretty cool monster and gore effects, Howl offers us a decent cast of characters to root for, and a few more to boo and hiss at. There are a few bits of comic relief from Calvin Dean as Paul that feel out of place here, but aside from that this one builds nicely and gets pretty tense in the last half of its ninety-two minute running time. Some of the twists in the script from Mark Huckerby and Nick Ostler seasoned horror fans will definitely see coming but some they probably will not. There are some nice twists here, while at the same time the movie will give monster movie fans and horror hounds enough creature feature action and bloodshed to matter.
As to the performances, they go a long way here. Preston and Marson are charming enough as the elderly couple on the train, there are moments here where you really do feel for them. Shauna Macdonald is also strong in the film, not likeable at first but that changes as the story progresses. Elliot Cowan is perfectly despicable in his role, he plays the part really well, and both Holly Weston and Rosie Day are quite well cast. Ed Speelers in the lead is really solid as the 'every man' type forced into a situation where he has to act, and he carries the film well.
Video/Audio/Extras:
Howl arrives on Blu-ray from Alchemy in an AVC encoded 1080p high definition 2.35.1 widescreen transfer. Shot digitally, there's obviously no print damage. Detail is good for a standard definition transfer and color reproduction is fine, although the vast majority of the movie does take place in a dimly lit train at night, so keep your expectations in check in that regard. Black levels are decent and shadow detail isn't bad either. There is some pretty obvious aliasing and line shimmering noticeable at times but otherwise the movie looks just fine and it is presented on Blu-ray free of compression artifacts or other digital anomalies.
English language audio options are offered in Dolby TrueHD 5 and Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo with removable subtitles provided in English and Spanish. The 5.1 track on the disc is pretty strong. There's good channel separation throughout the movie and the dialogue stays clean, clear and nicely balanced. The sound effects and score have good presence and depth and there are no problems with any hiss or distortion.
Extras include about twenty-five minutes of behind the scenes material made up of cast and crew interviews, effects test footage and general clips shot while the movie was in production. Some of this stuff is fairly interesting, particularly the parts that show how practical effects and CGI were used in tandem to create the monsters seen in the movie. Outside of that we get a trailer for the feature, trailers for a few other Alchemy titles, menus and chapter selection.
The Final Word:
Howl is a pretty solid horror movie - it's tense, it's well acted, it mixes a familiar and basic idea with a few unique twists and it's got some solid effects work too. The Blu-ray release from Alchemy treats it well, presenting the movie in very nice shape and with some decent behind the scenes material as its main supplement.
Click on the images below for full sized Blu-ray screen caps!
