Howling III: The Marsupials (1987)

EDIT 23/07/2024: As of writing this, I would like to thank John Cox (who would win an Oscar for his work on George Miller's Babe and Babe: Pig in the City) for kindly sending me several behind the scenes images of his work on Howling 3; these include images of Olga and Mikhail, as well as the images of the thylacine baby puppets. Cox also gave some information that has helped greatly for writing this article!

EDIT 12/08/2024: I have now updated this entry after having received several images from Bob McCarron, who headed the film's makeup effects, and also gave valuable information about how the effects were achieved via email! I would like to thank McCarron for his valuable help in shedding more light on this underrated little film!

The third Howling film was filmed in director Philippe Mora's native Australia, with special makeup effects realized by a native team headed by Bob McCarron, fresh off Ozploitation classics such as Mad Max 2, Turkey Shoot and Razorback. McCarron's team included Nik Dorning, John Cox, Vivienne MacGillacuddy, and sculptor Belinda Villani, with Calvin Lim credited for animatronics. Sadly as of now I can't find much in the way of behind the scenes or publicity photos for Howling III, but I hope that changes soon!

One of the film's main hurdles was budget, according to McCarron, 'I had three months of pre-production and a budget of $60,000.00 (...) My crew of seven were all good friends, but five of them had to be put up in Sydney accomodation for three months and we had to hire a large work-shop space for the three months, then plus materials, I am actually surprised I managed to get a salary'.

The early stages of transformation were realized as facial prosthetics; according to John Cox and Bob McCarron in our correspondences, the facial prosthetics were handled by Nik Dorning. Imogen Annesley as Jerboa and Dagmar Blahova as Olga had very subtle prosthetics made for the first stages of their transformations, with furrowed brows and dog-like noses.

More snout-faced prosthetices were applied to Annesley and Blahova, with similar prosthetics worn by Max Fairchild as Thylo, and Carole Skinner, Jennifer Vuletic and Glenda Linscott as the werewolf nuns.

The second stage of Olga's transformation was also realized as a smaller latex face mask worn by Blahova; quick cuts during editing would make it appear that she was transforming between each stage of prosthetic.

The first werewolf seen in the film was the 'werewolf woman' seen in a black and white recording. When it came to realizing the film's various werewolf suits, a unique approach was taken. These werewolves were not full hair-suits nor were they spandex suits with hair punched in. According to Bob McCarron himself, describing the werewolf woman (and also the process for the film's various other werewolves);

'This (the werewolf woman) is my favourite werewolf of the film, as I loved the black and white look. We did not use any spandex suits with hair sewn in. I wanted to see as much skin as possible, so we would apply various colours of body makeup, then apply prosthetics and then the hair was on stretch wig lace. Arms were tubular and body parts made for each section of the body, all custom made for each actor. Interesting fact, both myself and Philippe (Mora) wanted the werewolf woman to look a bit sexy, so I interviewed and photographed some thirty girls and then we found Deby (Wightman) who was a body builder and fitness instructor, she got the job.'

McCarron also clarified, 'Average make-up time for this type of werewolf look was 2-3 hours and 1 and 1/2 hours to remove (...) The hands of the werewolves were all made of foam latex and applied to the top of the hands only, which allowed actors to be able to feel with their hands, for eating, drinking, going to the bathroom etc, however the claws were made from resin, so they could actually rip your face off'.

The full werewolf form of Olga consisted of similar prosthetics with silver hair applied, and the mask was sculpted to have more detail as it would be shot in close-up. For the hospital transformation sequence, a prosthetic was applied to Dasha Blahova's torso to simulate that she had teats like those of a female wolf. For extreme close-up shots of the various werewolves snapping their jaws, duplicate puppet heads - made from the same sculpts and moulds as the main suits - were constructed; according to John Cox, the puppet heads were cable-operated to allow the eyes to blink and jaws to snap open.

The puppet Olga head in the film.

For the Jerboa transformation, a blonde-furred werewolf mask (only a static mask was made, due to the briefness of the scene) and prosthetics were constructed; the fur was actually one of the most expensive aspects of the werewolf suits, as according to McCarron, 'An average hand made wig cost at that time between $2000-$4,000, so when you have some seven werewolves in full hair suits and multiple transformations, the budget was eaten up very quickly'.

Another werewolf suit was made for Mikhail's attempt to break Olga free; a brief shot reveals that the Mikhail suit's mask could have its lips curl and eyes blink, as per the cable-operated mechanism. The photos of the preliminary sculpts show off what the Mikhal suit's design looked like before the fur was applied. It was John Cox who handled the male werewolves primarily, as well as mould-making.

According to Bob McCarron, 'It was also Deby (Wightman)'s boyfriend that starred as Mikhail the big werewolf. He was in fact about 6ft 3'' and had a huge bodybuilding body.'

The puppet Mikhail head in the film.

Thylo's transformation into a thylacine was done with 'change-o-head' puppetry as in the original Howling and American Werewolf in London albeit on a much lower budget.

A second stage static mask was also made for the transformation; the face shots are in motion and show only in grainy monitors, so the shots aren't the best.

The final thylacine form was realized the same way as the other werewolf suits, with a puppet head made for close-up shots; the fur was laid on Fairchild's back in a pattern to resemble the actual thylacine animal. Note, that is NOT any sort of spandex on his legs, but his own legs with hair lace overlayed and glued on!

Preliminary sculpts of the Thylo head.

Puppet Thylo head used for close-up shots.

The puppet Thylo head in the film.

A similar werethylacine suit and mask was made for the were-form of Burnham Burnham's character Kendi; the fur and undersuit was coated in grey paint with red strikes, mimicking the bodypaint he had put on in the previous scene.

The puppet Kendi head in the film.

McCarron's team also created several puppets to realize Jerboa's thylacine baby. McCarron told me; 'The baby Zac, started as a very small embryonic baby, which was a foam latex suit over an anaesthetised mouse, we put him into the suit and as he woke up, he moved up her body, I also had the same miniature suit on my finger that first appeared below the pouch'. For the Jerboa pouch prosthetic that the fetus crawls into, 'This (pouch) prosthetic came up under her chest and down between her legs and had a fine fur knotted into hair lace'.

The Jerboa pouch prosthetic.

The second stage baby was a rod-operated puppet, allowing it to make simple movements.

The larger thylacine baby puppet was a hand-operated puppet; according to Cox, Villani sculpted both the baby puppets. According to McCarron; 'The fully grown baby, was my absolute favourite, as as you can see I was the puppet handler. And Imogen and I had a great time as we both became very attached to Zac'.

A puppet was also created for the skeletonized Kendi.

A static prop head was made for the giant Thylo that attacks a squad of soldiers; presumably it was operated out of sight.

Another puppet was made for a nightmare sequence, McCarron stated; 'For the dream sequence we had her in a bed, but she was just reclining, so her legs went through the bed and we had her false body attached, so as it looked like she was laying flat (...) The photo of her giving the monster child a cigaret was during a break in filming. I was under the bed operating the child'.

Howling III had several 'fake' werewolves, as part of its wry commentary on the werewolf genre, with McCarron himself playing the mock wolfman for 'Shape Shifters Part 8' (a pointed jab at the future of the Howling films, which did reach to at least seven films, plus a reboot; so not far off, Mora!). McCarron said 'Nick Dorning my one time apprentice making me up as a werewolf for the film with Imogen starring, note the werewolf prosthetic on the back of the hand. I was not supposed to look like one of our Australian werewolf’s but a Very B Class werewolf'.

Of course, the film's infamous 'It Came from Uranus' film-within-a-film segment also required practical effects, parodying The Howling and American Werewolf in London's transformation sequences. A prosthetic wolf face and paws were made for the early stages of the mock transformation.

Additional puppets, including a rudimentary change-o-head, were also made for the 'It Came from Uranus' segment these having a more cartoony, parodic look to them.

Howling III's workload was immense for McCarron's team, especially with the low budget and quick shooting schedule, However, in our correspondence McCarron had this to say about his work on the film, which I'll leave as a final note;

'During production, I had a call from Rick Baker, about a film we were both going to be working on and he was telling me about Gorillas in the Mist and how he had only a $250'000 dollar budget for one gorilla. Philippe Mora said to me "Oh Bob, anyone can make a gorilla for $250'000, but not everyone can make a pack of werewolves for $60'000!"

Again I would like to thank Bob McCarron and John Cox for being so gracious as to send these images and behind the scenes info!