The 21 Greatest Werewolf Movies Of All Time, Ranked

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Though the film has a huge budget, impressive production and creature design and a mostly esteemed cast to its credit, Underworld never quite lives up to its "vampire vs. werewolf" premise and is all but bereft of emotional stakes, a point that feels more apparent with each subsequent entry into the action-packed franchise.

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While the film has a bad reputation thanks to its poor CGI and questionable decision to ape many aspects of its predecessor, An American Werewolf in Paris is a surprisingly watchable horror-comedy that is anchored by a stellar performance by the endlessly charismatic Tom Everett Scott.

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Film legends Mike Nichols and Jack Nicholson team up for this fun but ultimately hollow film about a down-and-out editor who takes back control of his professional life even as his newfound lycanthropy upends his personal relationships.

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A truly iconic film of the '80s, Teen Wolf is barely a werewolf movie by traditional means but the world would be damned if it didn't enjoy a teenage werewolf surfing on a school bus or slam dunking on a basketball court.

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While the core concept of Howl is pretty great, positing a stranded train full of strangers that is under siege by a werewolf, the film drops the ball with the opportunity for mystery and suspense when it prioritizes on revealing the big, furry monster at the center of it all.

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From the writer of The Hitcher and Near Dark, Bad Moon is a surprisingly brutal story whose ingenuity is also its downfall, as it largely centers on a dog who attempts to warn its owners that the newly moved-in uncle may be a bloodthirsty werewolf.

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Directed by acclaimed filmmaker Adrián García Bogliano and produced by indie horror maestro Larry Fessenden, Late Phases is a great slow-burn horror picture about the indignity of growing old paired with a tale of a blind man who takes it upon himself to defend his retirement community from a werewolf.

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The winner of the 2005 FANGORIA Chainsaw Award for Best Limited-Release/Direct-to-Video Film, this acclaimed sequel stands well in its own regard for continuing the allegories posited by the first Ginger Snaps while offering a legitimately gripping mystery and one hell of a nihilistic climax.

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Though this film may drift closer to the Teen Wolf side of campy werewolf projects, Wolfcop is nonetheless a fairly humorous movie that embraces the werewolf tropes and lore while providing copious amounts of over-the-top violence and exceptional practical special effects work.

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The Wolf of Snow Hollow may be an arguable entry to this list for reasons that may be too spoiler-heavy to include here, but the film effortlessly alternates between hilariously dry comedy, heartbreaking drama on grief and pain, and tense horror about a series of killings with the signs pointing to a lycanthropic suspect.

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An Estonian blend of fantasy and horror based on Andrus Kivirähk's 2000 novel Old Barny, this art house favorite might be too slow and convoluted for some but is nevertheless spellbinding and unique in almost every aspect.

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This werewolf film from 1985 may not be the best Stephen King adaptation of its time, but that does not change that the film is suspenseful and engaging in the way King's work often is while being bolstered by moments of ingenuity and a committed cast that goes above and beyond what's on the page.

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Visionary filmmaker Neil Jordan pulls no punches in this Gothic fantasy-horror hybrid, which features numerous short stories centered upon werewolves that are notably closer to the Grimm Brothers' variety of morbid fairy tales.

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Noted as the first werewolf film to be shot in color, The Curse of the Werewolf was the defining feature in the subgenre for Hammer Film Productions, which was elevated by a powerhouse performance from the inimitable Oliver Reed.

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Before he dived into The Descent, charged into Westeros with Game of Thrones and revived Hellboy in 2019, filmmaker Neil Marshall initially exhibited his passion for mauling monsters and hard-hitting action in Dog Soldiers, which pits an English military squadron on a training exercise under siege from a pack of bloodthirsty lycanthropes.

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You may recognize the name from the 2016 video game from Red Stom Entertainment and Ubisoft, but this hysterical horror-comedy remains a highlight among 2021's cinematic output as it weaves an outlandish and expertly crafted "whodunit" out of a solid werewolf thriller.

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A decadent yet chilling horror film from Christophe Gans, Brotherhood of the Wolf tells the twisty and bloody tale of a pair of mercenaries who are tasked with hunting down a werewolf that savagely targets the French countryside in the late 1700s.

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One of the most beloved independent horror films of all-time, Ginger Snaps injects dark humor and a feminist point-of-view to the werewolf movie for something that feels original while still producing the pulse-pounding horror and gore that fans of the subgenre have come to expect.

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Lon Chaney Jr. brought to life an instantly iconic creature feature in The Wolf Man, which has been incredibly successful and spawned four sequels, of which Chaney Jr. proudly returned to the titular role.

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Werewolf films rarely come as celebrated or as compelling as The Howling, Joe Dante's horror-thriller following a news reporter's suspicion that her vacation getaway may be home to a colony of lycanthropes.

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Regardless of changes in modern technology, the fact is that An American Werewolf in London will likely be the apex predator of werewolf movies, from its drop-dead funny sense of sardonic humor to its undeniably groundbreaking special effects work, which was so impressive that it inspired (and won) its own Academy Award category.