Does watching a “trashy werewolf movie” interest you? Then check out the 1996 horror flick, Bad Moon, a bonified Guilty Pleasure: a practically non-existent box office, and brutal reviews. I pulled the comment in the first sentence from one of the few decent reviews: “Bad Moon succeeds with what you want in a trashy werewolf movie.” Still, it has its moments.
HALF MAN. HALF WOLF. TOTAL TERROR.
With that tagline (seriously), here is a brief overview of an equally brief (79 minutes) film. The source material is a 1992 novel titled Thor, by Wayne Smith. Thor is a large German shepherd, and in the book, the story is told mostly through its point of view. In the film, Thor lives with single mom Janet Harrison (Mariel Hemingway) and young son Brett in an isolated house somewhere in the Pacific Northwest. The loyal dog zealously protects his family.
A happy reunion…at first.
Janet’s brother, Ted Harrison (Michael Paré), and his girlfriend, Marjorie, are photojournalists working on a story in Nepal when they are attacked by a werewolf. Marjorie is killed. Ted manages to blow it away but is wounded in the process, and we all know what that means. Like the gypsy lady in horror films of old used to say, “He who is bitten by a werewolf and lives, becomes a werewolf himself.”
Many months later we find Ted living in an Airstream trailer by a lake a few hours from Janet’s home. A happy family reunion does not include Thor, who is wary of Ted. Sniffing around a nearby wood, Thor comes upon various body parts. Yep, Ted is now a werewolf and has started killing.
WHAT COULD GO WRONG?
Ted’s “other half” is relentless.
Janet, pleased to be reunited with her brother, invites him to stay with her and Brett. Plenty of room to park his trailer on her land. Ted declines at first, but soon the body count in an adjacent wood grows as he can no longer control his lycanthropic tendencies, and the increased police activity sends him off to hang with his family. After all, what could possibly go wrong?
Thor, of course, is not a happy camper. He watches Ted most of the day, and at night, when Ted goes into a nearby forest and chains himself to a tree to prevent hurting anyone, Thor sees him in his werewolf persona. But what can the poor dog do?
The human Ted is getting meaner by the day. Disdaining his chains one night, he approaches the house. There, he sees a sleazy salesman with whom Janet had a nasty encounter a few days earlier. He rips the guy apart but then is attacked by Thor. Running off, he becomes human again, and he leaves poor Thor to take the blame for the man’s death. Animal Control drags Thor off, leaving Janet and Brett vulnerable to Ted’s next change.
Thor will do anything to protect his people.
Plenty more to come, so if this tickles your lycanthropic bones, give Bad Moon a try. I was especially impressed with the performance of Thor, played by a dog named Primo. Subsequent reviews that I read praised Thor as the best “actor” in the film. I can’t disagree with that.