Bad Moon (1996)

Bad Moon (1996)

There are a lot of bad werewolf films out there, from bad wolf costumes, bad transitions from human to wolf, bad scripts, and just overall bad acting.  One great example of a film having all of those unfortunate traits to make it a bad werewolf films, is 1996's Bad Moon.  The film doesn't even succeed in being campy, it is just forgettable and objectively bad in every way.

Bad Moon was written and directed by Eric Red. The film was based on the Wayne Smith's 1992 novel Thor.  Bad Moon was produced by Morgan Creek, and distributed by Warner Brothers in 1996.  The film was a box office disaster grossing only $1.1 million with a budget of $7 million.  The film also received negative reviews from the critics.  Writer/director Eric Red's real life story is more interesting than this terrible film, in 2000 Eric Red allegedly lost consciousness while driving and crashed his truck into a busy bar, killing two men.  He then got out of and tried to slit his own throat with a piece of glass.  He was taken to the hospital, where he remained for a couple of weeks, however he never saw criminal charges, and was sued by the families of the dead men and had to pay around a million dollars to them.   After Bad Moon in 1996 he wouldn't make another film until 2008 when he made the supernatural horror film 100 Feet.

Bad Moon stars Michael Pare as Ted Harrison, Mariel Hemingway plays his sister Janet Harrison, and Mason Gamble plays his nephew Brett Harrison, and a German Shepherd named Primo plays Thor.  While on a work assignment in the jungles of Nepal he is attacked by a werewolf, and he is cursed with lycanthropy.  Back home in the USA (though filmed in British Columbia) he starts killing people at night in the forest near his home, then he moves in with his sister and nephew, putting them in danger, but their family dog Thor fights to protect them.   Mariel Hemingway is the granddaughter of writer Ernest Hemingway, and Mason Gamble is best known for his debut film role of playing Dennis in the 1993 film Dennis The Menace.  The great actor in the film was Primo, who was a good dog and played the cute, intelligent, and powerful Thor.  The humans were all absolutely terrible, none of them were believable, and they all gave very amateurish performances, which most likely was due to the absolutely terrible screenplay penned by Eric Red.

If you ever come across this film, don't just pass it up, but take it off of the shelf and hide it so some poor unsuspecting fan of werewolf films doesn't accidently purchase this terrible film.  I feel sorry for the poor folks that spent the money to see this in the theater, definitely a bad use of the $3-$6 that the ticket likely cost them in 1996.  Some films have the benefit of being bad in a good way, or so bad that they are good, or even so bad that they are unintentionally funny, Bad Moon isn't one of those films, this is just bad in every way.  This film was so bad I am amazed that anyone would ever offer Eric Red to ever make a film again after this, this might be some of the worst writing and direction that I have ever seen in a film, but not in a campy bad way, just in an almost unwatchable way.  This is coming from someone who ranks among their favourite directors, Ed Wood, and Roger Corman, so to say that this film is actually so bad that it is torture to watch isn't hyperbole.  I love bad movies, but this film is unforgivable.  The best acting in this film is from the dog, and maybe the ten seconds or so of a clip of Werewolf In London that plays on a television in the background, hell I wish I could have just stopped watching this and watched Werewolf In London instead, it is miles ahead of this piece of dog shit.   Do not watch this film, under any circumstances, please spend your time doing something better than watching Bad Moon, anything would be a better use of your time than this abysmal excuse for a film.   It looks bad, the acting is unforgivably bad, the writing and directing is atrocious, there is no reason to watch this film, so I beg you please be kind to yourself and don't watch this movie.   My only hope is that I can forget about its existence, because if I have any great regrets in my life, it is that I watched Bad Moon.