Silver Bullet (1985)

Silver Bullet is a strange outlier in Stephen King films.  Based on the novella Cycle of the Werewolf, which itself isn't one of the more well-known works by King, it features a pre-fame Cory Haim, a pre-accident Gary Busey and a director, Daniel Attias, whose sole feature credit is this film.  

The story is told from the point of view of Jane Coslaw (Megan Follows), a young girl saddled with looking after her disabled brother Marty (Haim).  She recounts the story of a series of murders that happened in the small town of Tarker's Mills in 1976, beginning with the beheading of a railroad worker.  As the killings escalate the local sheriff Joe Haller (Terry O'Quinn) comes under siege from the locals to do something about the random killings plaguing the town. 

Marty, always big on imagination, posits that it might be a werewolf.  This is something his uncle Red (Busey) shrugs off and Marty only half believes.  That is until Marty sneaks off to light fireworks in the middle of the night and encounters the creature, firing a rocket into its eye and wounding it.  He confides in Jane who, skeptical at first, soon discovers the person in town with the wound her brother described.  Red also comes around, having a friend forge a special silver bullet to take out the beast once and for all.

Silver Bullet was produced by Dino de Laurentiis, who was responsible for a gaggle of the King adaptations in the mid-1980s.  Although the screenplay was written by King the movie took some liberties with the story, with the werewolf being able to change at will rather than being bound by the lunar cycle like in most legends, with the full moon being when the wolf part is strongest.  Since the story was originally meant as vignettes to go along with a calendar, and the lunar cycle was tweaked to go along with recognizable holidays, this allowed him to rectify that situation.  As in the story no explanation is given for how the werewolf came to be, nor is it hinted there may be others.  The surprise lies in it being one of the least likely people. 

Another thing the movie and the story have in common is that the werewolf is more like those in The Howling, where it is aware of what it is, who it is and what it is doing whether in wolf or human form.  It is touched on that there is a level of guilt during a nightmare sequence, but unlike Larry Talbot this werewolf seems fine with what it is.  The design of the creature doesn't copy The Wolf Man, but it does make it much more anthropomorphic than An American Werewolf in London.  The best comparison, again, would be to the ones found in The Howling.  

Cory Haim, not yet saddled with many of the problems that lead to a meteoric drop from public view and a tragic adult life, is good as Marty.  These days the role most likely would have gone to someone who was an actual paraplegic, but Haim is convincing.  Marty is also, despite what his sister Jane thinks, a pretty good kid.  He's not one of the annoying precocious kids that brings down many a good film.  Megan Follows is decent as well, even if the character of Jane is a bit annoying until she becomes more of a true part of the story.  While Red may feel like many characters Busey has played since his motorcycle accident there is a lot more acting going into creating the kids' miscreant uncle, with the manic personality Busey is known for not invading the role as much despite the fact he ad-libbed a good many parts of his dialogue. 

For a director with only one film under his belt Daniel Attias does a great job.  The opening kill is quite well-filmed and effective, and the first half of Silver Bullet is a bloodier than most of its contemporaries, as the prudishness of parents' groups and certain movie critics was leading the MPAA to turn most horror films into anemic affairs at the time.  It has several great set pieces as well.  It slows down quite a bit in the middle, but there is still enough story and good performances from the main cast to carry it through.

I have always thought that Silver Bullet was never given the true chance to get an audience, although it has managed to be recognized as one of the better King adaptations over the years.  It received an unfair critical drubbing at the time of release, although the usual suspects that hate horror films were the ones that praised it.  I enjoyed it from the first time I saw it and, to be honest, like it better than the source material it came from.

Silver Bullet (1985)

Time: 95 minutes

Starring: Cory Haim, Gary Busey, Megan Follows, Everitt McGill

Director: Daniel Attias