I can't honestly believe that this is a sequel or follow up of John Landis classic comedy horror movie from 1981 . I suppose you can't really describe it as an original werewolf movie either since the bare bones of the story steal elements from the one set in London: An American tourist visits a famous European capital , he narrowly survives a werewolf attack that kills a colleague , he embarks ( Pardon the pun ) on a sexual relationship with someone in the medical profession , he turns into a werewolf , he's visited by apparitions of his dead victims , etc etc . and reading the previous line I've just discovered how much the storyline has in common with the original that it seems very similar indeed . The difference lies in how enjoyable and entertaining the Landis movie is

With this Paris based movie there's no scenes that really stand out . There's no naked man waking up in a zoo wondering how he's going to get back home with no money or clothes , there's no bizarre dream sequence of Naziwerewolves and there's no spectacular climax . AAWIP does try to be funny but is there anything more embarrassing than failed humour ? I'm thinking of the scene where Andy McDermott has to convince someone he's got chewing gum in his pocket and not condoms ! Perhaps the biggest difference between the two movies is that there's no poignancy involved with this dubious follow up . You really do feel sorry for the protagonist's fate and dilemma in the London movie , here you just feel Andy is nothing more than a cypher going through the literary motions of a script . There's also a large number of plot holes visible . Is this the first time The Lunar Club have carried out a massacre ? If not then aren't large numbers of corpses with their hearts torn out been reported in the world's press ? Why haven't the police got leads ?

Everyone else has mentioned it and so will I - The visuals are poor . Look at the bungee jumping scene at The Eifell Tower , it's painfully obvious that it's achieved via some blue screen projection while the werewolf transformation is done by some very cartoonish CGI . I won't put Anthony Waller in the same bracket as Stephen Sommers as a director who totally ruins a movie because of an over reliance on CGI ( The major problem with AAWIP is the screenplay coupled with a high degree of expectation from those who saw the 1981 movie classic ) but I would have preferred the Rick Baker type special effects used for the transformation . To be fair it's reasonable to speculate that perhaps the budget didn't stretch that far . But at the end of the day this is a fairly poor horror movie that didn't need to be made and DOG SOLDIERS is much better entertainment

Andy McDermott (Tom Everett Scott) is backpacking across Europe with his two idiot friends. They have this daredevil game and Andy climbs up the Eiffel tower after hours. They find Serafine Pigot (Julie Delpy) jumping off the tower and Andy jumps off after her. Luckily he has a bungee cord tie to him. Andy tracks her down. She reluctantly agrees to go out with her. She's a werewolf in Paris and there is a whole society of werewolves. The boys get lured to an underground club and it's a night of terror. Julie Bowen plays American tourist Amy Finch.

This starts off really badly with a stupid looking Eiffel tower sequence. Then there are twiddle dee and twiddle dumb. The movie is trying very hard to be funny and fails miserably. Tom Everett Scott is playing a goofball but he comes off as really pathetic. The stupidity of the three guys is really annoying. The CGI is functional and probably the best that could be hoped for at the time. The makeup looks bloody. The simple scary plot of the original is lost in this chaos of CGI wolves and camp. The original was a really good example of a well made horror. This is an example of a poorly done one.

In the past four years, I've repeatedly heard how this movie, a sequel to AN American WEREWOLF IN London, is such a travesty that it blackens the name of the first classic movie. How it's inferior in every way. As such my opinions were exceptionally low before I started watching. And you know what? I had a blast! It may be inferior to its predecessor but that doesn't stop it being a totally entertaining B-movie with lots of (dumb) humour to keep it enjoyable. This is an inoffensive comedy/horror yarn with plenty of bloody gore effects and alarming makeup, some sick humour, lots of werewolves and some cool action bits to keep it running smoothly along.

On the plus side, the Paris setting makes for a nice change even if nothing much is made of it - aside from the expected Eiffel Tower shenanigans. What I liked most were the mostly French supporting cast, who are actually pretty good in their roles and a lot more convincing than the American leads on whom the film focuses. People like Pierre Cosso as the villain Claude and Tom Novembre as the Inspector put in solid turns and fit their parts well. As for the leads, well let's just say that the supporting Phil Buckman and Vince Vieluf are no actors, but their parts are fairly minor in any case. Tom Everett Scott, as the lead who becomes a werewolf, is no great actor either, but he's at least passable in the role and not too irritating. Unlike Julie Delpy, a supposedly alluring French actress who I just find to be annoying.

It's true that some scenes of this film are misjudged, like the comedic bungee jumps which bookend the production and are badly mishandled. So, too, are the rotting ghosts of the werewolf victims doomed to walk the earth. In the first film Griffin Dunne was a genuine symbol of black comedy at its bleakest; here, the characters are used for cheap scares and gross-out humour like eyeballs dropping out. Not needed. The dumb American characters are pretty unappealing too and the music far too "hip" for its own good.

On the plus side, the film is liberal with its violence and bloodshed, which is always nice to see, and the werewolves themselves aren't as bad as I was led to believe. Sure, the CGI effects are unconvincing as always, but what reviewers neglect to mention is that the appearance of these creatures actually manages to be frightening, leading to a lot of effective jolt moments. The parties at which the werewolves rip apart their victims and cause havoc recall the best bits of FROM DUSK TILL DAWN and are a visceral delight. The plot, although clichéd and contrived, keeps moving along and keeps you watching. AN American WEREWOLF IN Paris is never boring. Deeply flawed perhaps, but surprisingly entertaining in a brain-dead kind of way and worth at least one watch for horror buffs.