The Wolf Man is a 1941 American Gothic horror film written by Curt Siodmak and produced and directed by George Waggner. The film stars Lon Chaney Jr. in the title role. Claude Rains, Warren William, Ralph Bellamy, Patric Knowles, Bela Lugosi, Evelyn Ankers, and Maria Ouspenskaya star in supporting roles. The title character has had a great deal of influence on Hollywood's depictions of the legend of the werewolf. The film is the second Universal Pictures werewolf film, preceded six years earlier by the less commercially successful Werewolf of London (1935). This film is one of the Universal Monsters movies, and garnered great acclaim for its production.

Plot

Larry Talbot returns to his ancestral home in Llanwelly, Wales, to bury his recently deceased brother and reconcile with his estranged father, Sir John Talbot. Larry falls in love with a local girl named Gwen Conliffe who runs an antique shop. As an excuse to talk to her, he purchases a walking stick decorated with a silver wolf's head. Gwen tells him that it represents a werewolf, a man who changes into a wolf "at certain times of the year". The werewolf always sees a pentagram on the palm of his next victim. Various villagers recite a poem whenever werewolves are mentioned.