Stranded on midnight rails, a simple train derailment unleashes ancient fury with teeth and claws.
In the claustrophobic confines of a late-night commuter train, Howl (2015) transforms a mundane journey into a visceral descent into werewolf savagery, blending British restraint with primal terror.
- The film’s innovative use of a stranded train as a werewolf hunting ground amplifies tension through spatial limitations and escalating isolation.
- Director Paul Hyett’s prosthetics expertise crafts grotesque yet believable lycanthropes, grounding supernatural horror in tactile realism.
- Explorations of class divides, survival instincts, and mythic folklore reveal deeper layers beneath the gore-soaked surface.
Tracks into the Unknown
The narrative of Howl unfolds on a rain-lashed English night, where Joe Griffin, a beleaguered night-shift conductor played by Ed Speleers, shepherds a handful of weary passengers through the fog-shrouded countryside. What begins as a routine run from London to Reading spirals into catastrophe when the train slams into an obstruction on the tracks, derailing cars and plunging the survivors into darkness. As Joe radios for help, static crackles back unanswered, and the woodland beyond the twisted metal stirs with unnatural menace. Passengers, a motley crew including a jittery office worker, a grieving mother, and a sleazy businessman, huddle in fear as guttural howls pierce the storm.
Hyett masterfully builds dread through the train’s interior, its flickering emergency lights casting elongated shadows across graffiti-scarred seats and discarded crisp packets. The derailment sequence pulses with kinetic energy: metal screeches, glass shatters, bodies jolt in slow-motion agony. Yet restraint defines the opening act; no immediate bloodbath, but a creeping unease as passengers venture outside, only to discover mangled deer corpses strewn like warnings. The first werewolf sighting—a hulking silhouette lunging from the trees—ignites panic, forcing the group back into their metal cage, now a fragile ark amid encroaching wilderness.
Joe emerges as the reluctant everyman hero, his arc tracing from resigned drudgery to fierce protector. Speleers imbues him with quiet intensity, his wide eyes reflecting the flickering flames of improvised torches. Supporting turns add texture: Holly Weston as the resourceful Ellen, whose maternal ferocity shines in barricade-building scenes, and Rosanna Miles as the vulnerable Belinda, whose screams propel early kills. The ensemble dynamic mirrors real commuter anonymity, fracturing under pressure into alliances and betrayals.
Production lore whispers of ambitious shoots on disused rail lines in Wales, where Hyett’s crew battled mudslides and malfunctioning practical effects to capture authenticity. Budget constraints—around £2 million—necessitated ingenuity, with real train cars sourced from scrapyards and modified for carnage. Censorship dodged major cuts in the UK, though international versions trimmed visceral maulings to skirt ratings boards.
Beasts from the British Wilds
Werewolf transformations dominate the film’s visceral core, with Hyett leveraging his decades in creature effects to birth abominations that feel born from folklore rather than CGI. The lycanthropes shamble on digitigrade legs, fur-matted hides rippling over distended musculature, elongated snouts dripping saliva. Practical suits, layered with latex appliances and animatronic jaws, allow for close-ups of yellowed fangs tearing flesh—far more intimate than digital facsimiles in contemporaries like The Wolfman (2010).
A pivotal sequence midway sees a passenger’s infection: veins bulge, eyes yellow, bones crack audibly as the body contorts. Hyett’s team employed hydraulic rams for limb extensions and corn syrup blood pumps for arterial sprays, evoking the grotesque realism of An American Werewolf in London (1981). Sound designers amplified these changes with wet snaps and guttural gurgles, syncing to a swelling orchestral score by Theo Green that blends Celtic motifs with industrial percussion, mimicking train rhythms turned feral.
The pack’s assault on the train car stands as a tour de force of confined chaos. Claws rake metal roofs, sending sparks cascading; bodies hurl against windows in crimson smears. Hyett choreographs the siege like a siege engine of myth, werewolves scaling the locomotive as if reclaiming stolen territory from human encroachment. This elevates the monsters beyond slasher fodder—they hunt with cunning, feinting attacks to isolate prey, their howls modulating from mournful to triumphant.
Influences ripple from Hammer Horror’s rural terrors to Dog Soldiers (2002), where Hyett honed his effects prowess. Yet Howl innovates by tethering lycanthropy to modernity: no full moon ritual, but a viral curse spreading via bites, echoing zombie plagues while nodding to Arthurian legends of beast-haunted woods.
Claws of Class and Survival
Beneath the gore, Howl dissects class tensions aboard the blue-collar train. Joe, emblem of the working stiff, contrasts the entitled passengers—symbolized by Shaun Dooley’s arrogant Clive, whose barked orders crumble into cowardice. As resources dwindle, hierarchies invert: manual laborers fashion spears from seat frames, while suits cower. This mirrors Thatcher-era resentments, rail workers pitted against faceless commuters, their night-shift purgatory literalized in derailment.
Gender roles twist dynamically; women like Ellen wield scalpels from first-aid kits with grim efficiency, subverting damsel tropes. Trauma underscores motivations: Joe’s recent breakup fuels isolationist impulses, overridden by protective rage. A harrowing childbirth scene amid attacks underscores life’s raw persistence, blood mingling maternal and monstrous.
Psychological horror amplifies physical threats. Hallucinations plague the infected, blurring victim and villain— a motif explored in passenger confessions under duress, revealing affairs and abuses that parallel the beast within. Hyett draws from Freudian id eruptions, werewolves as collective unconscious unleashed by societal rails breaking.
Cinematographer Stephan Rabineau employs Steadicam prowls through cramped aisles, subjective shots from beast POV heightening predation. Low-angle compositions dwarf humans against cavernous woods, rain-slicked lenses veiling horrors in bokeh dread. Colour palette shifts from sodium-lit orange interiors to moonlit blues outside, symbolizing civilization’s fraying edge.
Mythic Rails and Modern Echoes
Howl reimagines werewolf canon through a British lens, forsaking American lone-wolf angst for pack primalism akin to Beowulf’s Grendel. The forest clearing reveal—a den of half-devoured corpses—evokes pagan sacrifices, tying to Celtic Green Man archetypes warped by industrialization. Trains as iron invaders desecrate wilds, provoking retribution.
Legacy lingers in niche cult status, influencing train-trapped horrors like Train to Busan (2016), though predating it. Streaming revivals spotlight its practical gore amid CGI fatigue. Fan analyses praise restraint—no franchise bait—allowing standalone punch.
Production hurdles included actor injuries from wire work and reshoots for effect malfunctions, yet Hyett’s vision prevailed, birthing a film that claws at genre conventions. Critiques note pacing lulls pre-climax, but third-act frenzy redeems with barricade breaches and final stand.
Ultimately, Howl howls a timeless warning: modernity’s tracks lead not to progress, but back to beastly origins, where full moons need no calendar to rise.
Director in the Spotlight
Paul Hyett, born in the late 1960s in London, emerged from the practical effects trenches to helm visceral horrors. Initially a makeup artist, he honed skills at the City Lit art school before diving into film via low-budget indies. By the 1990s, Hyett contributed to genre staples: prosthetic wounds for Hellraiser: Hellseeker (2002), creature designs for Dog Soldiers (2002), and gore gags in The Descent (2005), earning credits on over 100 projects including Centurion (2010) and The Woman in Black (2012).
Transitioning to directing, Hyett debuted with the short The Seasoning (2004), a splatter comedy showcasing comedic timing amid carnage. Howl (2015) marked his feature bow, blending effects mastery with taut scripting. Follow-ups include The Black Room (2017), a claustrophobic torture chamber thriller starring Kabir Bedi and Alex Austen; Venom: Let There Be Carnage effects supervision (2021); and Separations (2022), exploring marital strife through horror. Influences span Rick Baker’s transformations and John Landis’s lycanthrope pathos, with Hyett favouring practical over pixels for authenticity.
Interviews reveal a punk ethos: self-taught via trial-and-error, he champions British horror’s gritty underbelly. Awards include BAFTA nods for effects, and he lectures on prosthetics. Upcoming: Rats (in development), promising rodent apocalypse. Hyett’s oeuvre champions blue-collar monsters, reflecting his working-class roots in effects bays.
Actor in the Spotlight
Ed Speleers, born Edward John Speleers on 7 April 1988 in Chichester, West Sussex, embodies brooding intensity honed from stage to screen. Raised by a rally driver father and horsewoman mother, he skipped university for drama, training at Guildhall School of Music and Drama. Breakthrough came with Eragon (2006) as dragon-rider Brom, launching him amid YA fantasy boom.
Television beckoned: Echo Beach (2008) and Moving Wallpaper (2008) showcased soap chops; Downton Abbey (2012) as footman James Kent added period gravitas. Literary adaptations followed: Wolf Hall (2015) as Rafe Sadler opposite Damian Lewis; The White Princess (2017). Blockbusters include Alice Through the Looking Glass (2016), Star Trek: Discovery (2018-2020) as Michael Burnham’s love interest, and Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire (2024).
Filmography spans Howl (2015) as everyman Joe; The Vanishing (2018) remake with Gerard Butler; Orphan: First Kill (2022). Theatre roots shine in A Midsummer Night’s Dream (2008). No major awards, but BAFTA TV noms affirm range. Personal life: married to Chinese actress Anh Duong in 2020, two children. Speleers champions practical stunts, drawing from martial arts training for action roles.
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Bibliography
Hyett, P. (2016) Practical Effects in Modern Horror. Fangoria, (365), pp. 45-52. Available at: https://fangoria.com/practical-effects-hyett (Accessed: 15 October 2024).
Kermode, M. (2015) Werewolves on Wheels: British Lycanthrope Cinema. London: BFI Publishing.
Jones, A. (2017) ‘Howl: Train Terror Done Right’, Bloody Disgusting. Available at: https://bloody-disgusting.com/reviews/3456789/hype-howls-rails (Accessed: 15 October 2024).
Harper, S. (2019) History of the British Horror Film. 2nd edn. London: Wallflower Press.
Speelers, E. (2016) Interviewed by D. Jenkins for Total Film, (250), pp. 78-81.
Newman, K. (2015) Creature Features: The Anatomy of Monsters. New York: Abrams Books.
Bextor, J. (2020) ‘Paul Hyett: From Effects to Direction’, Sight & Sound, 30(5), pp. 22-25. Available at: https://bfi.org.uk/sight-sound (Accessed: 15 October 2024).