A Tennessee Werewolf in Texas

I've traditions when October arrives to do several things to accentuate one of my favorite holidays, Halloween. Among these traditions is to watch a few old, Universal Studios horror movies, among which are Dracula with Bela Lugosi, Frankenstein, with Boris Karloff, The Bride of Frankenstein, The original The Mummy, again with Boris Karloff The Invisible Man, starring Claude Rains, and The Wolf Man, with Lon Chaney Jr. There are others but these are my favorites.

Last night, I stayed up late to watch The Wolf Man and even though I've seen it several times, I was struck by something I've not noticed in the past which is how the director made it subtlety possible that the werewolf was unreal and might have been a figment of the imagination. 

On the surface, we, the viewers, presumed poor Larry, played by Lon Chaney Jr, was bitten by a werewolf thus making him also a werewolf. He then terrorized a small town on nightly outings of murderous rampages. A good movie plot.

However, after watching it again last night, I realized it might have been a strong power of suggestion, a mass hypnosis which is even alluded to by the character Sir John Talbot played by Claude Rains. Larry, the "wolfman", might have been convinced by local gypsies and fortune tellers that he was a werewolf. 

There is in reality, a clinical name for this condition, a psychiatric syndrome called lycanthropy that involves a delusion that the affected person can transform into an animal.

After viewing The Wolfman movie this year I noticed several clues that it was all psychological.

• Larry Talbot was never seen by others as a werewolf.
• Both the first werewolf, Bela, and later Larry, knew who their next victims were before they presumably transformed into a wolfman. This suggests a self-fulfilling prophecy.
• By the end of the movie Sir Talbot, a staunch sceptic of the wolfman, became convinced of the possibility of werewolves and thus claims to have seen him.

A good classic movie, to be sure, especially this time of year but it reminds me of a prevalent, everyday, condition in todays world which may have little to do with lycanthropy and more so with the Pygmalion Effect referring to a persons performance or self image being affected by the expectations  others impose upon him or he; the power of suggestion or mass hypnosis. 

If a person was raised in an environment where the expectations imposed upon him or her by others, like family for instance, then his or her performance in school, jobs, relationships etc., will meet those expectations, good or bad. It may be a form of mass hypnosis or the power of suggestion, a self fulfilling prophecy. 

The key to being free from this curse isn't the solution in  The Wolfman, to be killed by a silver bullet, but to change our mindset, which takes work but it's critical that we free ourselves from the expectations imposed upon us by others and believe in ourselves.