THE HOWLING – film analysis
The fable of the noble savage
is something this movie perpetuates.
Deep rooted neurosis is caused by the repression of natural re-occurring
desires. The Colony is a cult looking
for born again werewolves, much like born again Christians. Red lighting in the beginning and end used to
represent intimacy, transformation, and horror.
The Howling is a battle within the mind and spirit. It’s a battle of humanity versus animal
instinct fought in the trenches of the medulla oblongata for the fate of the
neo-cortex. Primal desires can
overshadow reasoning and logic, turning man to beast, or in the case of The
Howling, man to werewolf.
A jungle of neon clouds the
senses just as it confuses and scrambles radio signals and broadband communication. The television is the retina of the mind’s
eye, a reflection of true subconscious desire.
Television static is reasoning clouding desire, subjugating it and
repressing it. Words and images may
escape through the fuzz but they are fragmented misrepresentations of their
original intent, twisted and often times confusing. To escape the neon static that clouds the
soul and confuses the mind one must leave the urban jungle return to nature;
return to yourself. Incompetence and
uncertainty are products of a clouded mind, of one who does not understand the
longings of their inner beast, or who are afraid to act out on it.
Fear springs from this
uncertainty, for if one does not know themselves then what can they know? Fear is not for the id, the impulsive; the
passionate do not experience true fear. Fear is manufactured through the conscious
mind, therefore it is a product of the neo-cortex, of humanity and logic and
compassion, for true compassion is the fear of loss, the recognition of potential
disaster. Eddie doesn’t experience fear
because he is the living embodiment of the id.
He has been reborn to accept the “gift” given to us all, the gift of a
life without worry or fear, a life of simplicity and survival, of embracing the
beast within.
Karen is nearly crippled with
fear. Her every movement is cautious and
calculated; every potential threat analyzed and mulled over. Karen internalizes her struggles with the
beast, with the id; her journey through the film is a struggle against Mother
Nature and all her carnal influence. Karen cannot see Eddie because she cannot
accept the id. She abstains from it. Eddie wants to give her a piece of his mind;
a symbolic offer to embrace impulsive desires, to shed the chains of repression that have lead to her deeply rooted
neurosis, to kill the fear by becoming one with it.
But Karen seems incapable of
accepting what Eddie has to offer. Her
conscious mind reactively buries it into her subconscious, leaving her dazed
and confused as if in a trance. Her
civilized mind cannot readily express what her primitive subconscious is trying
to tell her. She needs time to process
the information, she needs time for Eddie’s gift to transform her from within,
and she struggles against this metamorphosis throughout the film. She struggles to suppress the id with the
fabric of her being, as the id would rob her of her civilized identity, it
would consume her and transform her into something new, something dangerous,
and uproot her social status, severing ties with humanity as she gives herself
over to the natural world, and to a certain degree the supernatural one as well.
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