Monster Dog (1984)

Monster Dog (1984) Directed by Claudio Fragasso

Alice Cooper plays the lead role in this groovy, misty, canine Euro-horror pseudo lycanthropy yarn as Vince Raven – pretty much a meta-characterization of his persona- a rock singer returning to his hometown along with his production crew to shoot a music video, but as soon as he approaches the thick gloom that engulfs the area, dark foggy reminiscences of his fateful upbringing haunt him, untamed vicious hungry hounds prowl the vicinity and a formidable ravenous beast seeks out victims to satiate its ferocious full-moon nocturnal appetite. Claudio Fragasso doing what he does best – shamelessly plagiarizing genre classics and rendering a senseless, sensationalistic, cheap variation of Anglo-Saxon movie fashions – repurposes the werewolf cliché lore and transfers it to modern day by featuring more of the same, except this time with a rock icon as the protagonist; Alice Cooper is not a great actor, and Fragasso is no movie whiz either, but both are terrific entertainers and understand damn well what the target audience is expecting from an insanely cool product like this, and even if it’s not high quality fun, at least it’s intuitively entertaining. Cooper leverages his morbid, gothic look to transcend his rock star status, and Fragasso molds him into pulp horror iconography. This isn’t a movie about a Wolfman, it’s about a Dogman! Plus, the film benefits from opening and closing with the catchiest song Alice Cooper has ever performed, the neglected show-stopping Identity Crisis.