09/01/09 (LONDON) Joel Meadows
One of the reasons why it’s great to be located in London is that there is always something going on in terms of film and culture. At the end of August for the past decade, FrightFest has been a festival celebrating the new and the classic in horror. In 2009, they showed An American Werewolf in London, presented by its director John Landis, to celebrate its imminent release on Blu-ray. Held at the Empire Leicester Square, one of the most prestigious cinemas in the UK, it was spectacular to watch a film I’d been obsessed with as a teenager but had never seen on a big screen before. It was also clear that the film has lost none of its impact in the intervening years with the director’s clever choice of incidental music still as inventive as it ever was and the black comedy still raw and affecting. We are planning a full-blown Landis feature in the next TRIPWIRE and I’ll be reviewing the Blu-Ray in the next month or so but here are a few photos for you from the event including John Landis with some of the British crew from the film gathered together in a brief Q&A after the showing…
