Claws & Saucers

“WEREWOLF OF WOODSTOCK” (1975) Review

THE WEREWOLF OF WOODSTOCK (John Moffitt, 66 min, color, 1975)

What’s Happening: Old werewolf attacks young hippies in Woodstock, NY

Famous For: Obscure TV werewolf movie

Six years after the Woodstock festival, Dick Clark’s TV production company concocted this guileless and half-decent combination of werewolf movie and hippie movie.

Perhaps it’s just as well that America had moved on since the days of the real Woodstock festival.  Everyone gets along, old and young, hippie and cop.

The bad guy is a grumpy drunkard resentful at the “lousy hippies” and “miserable freaks” who left all their garbage behind after the festival.  But he becomes strangely sympathetic in werewolf form.

The hippie band and local police team up to trap the werewolf.  How do they team up?  They combine psychedelic music with police sirens!  It’s almost symbolic.

Michael J. Weldon (Psychotronic Guide) recalls seeing the movie on ABC’s late-night Wide World of Mystery and feeling astonished at the cheapness.  Indeed it is cheap even for the times, shot on videotape with inept amateur actors.

While set in New York immediately after the Woodstock festival, it’s obviously the California hills outside LA, though they did build a small replica soundstage and scaffold towers.

I liked that the guy becomes the werewolf after getting electrocuted at the towers because the actual towers were a real concern during the rain at the actual festival (as you can see in the 1970 Michael Wadleigh film).

Werewolf fans may be hoping for a transformation sequence, but no go, not even time-lapse.  We do get a shot of a half moon but apparently the guy turns werewolf at random.  He has a straightforward werewolf mask and gloves.  We get a silver bullet reference at the end.

The vague scientific explanation for the transformation is that electric shocks can mutate living tissue.  One example: “hair follicles produce hair at five times the normal speed.”  So hey, why not a werewolf?

Everything is silly and small-time but not unenjoyable.  Took me years to find it (finally found an uploaded bootleg videotape on a Russian streaming site) but worth the effort.  At the climax, the Zeppelinesque instrumental is not bad at all.

Sources may claim other running times but it’s 66 min complete without commercials.

Action: 5.  Gore: 5.  Sex: 3.  Quality: 4.  Camp: 6.

Don’t miss: Werewolf on wheels

Quotable credo: “That’s what I like, man.  Transcendental thinking.”

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Article text copyright 2025 David Elroy Goldweber