Hey, it's been a while since we visited the fine folks over at the free streaming joint SHOUT FACTORY TV and it looks like they have a bunch of cool new stuff up! BAD MOON! That's a good one! Let's have a BAD MOON party!
I'm going to let you in on a little life hacking tip, if you are having a crappy day all you need to turn it around is a werewolf movie and an alcoholic beverage of your choice. In extreme cases, you might want to find a werewolf movie that stars a dog. BAD MOON is a werewolf movie that indeed stars a dog. In fact, it's based on a book entitled THOR, which tells the entire tale (haha) from the doggie's viewpoint (I don't recommend the audio book though – it's just a lot of barking). Honestly, I remember not being crazy about BAD MOON when I saw it in the theaters but it certainly has grown on me over the years. At first I could only see the missed opportunities but now that I've come to understand that MICHAEL PARE and MARIEL HEMINGWAY movies don't exactly grow on trees, I can appreciate it better. Plus, I just love the look of the werewolf in this movie. He's got that standing upright HOWLING-thing going on which I prefer to the simple fur-face or crawling-on-all-fours kind. All of the classic werewolf themes concerning our darker selves, loss of control and fear of hurting others are present and accounted for, plus you get a crispy new spin involving family loyalty and a mother having to learn to let go of her troubled sibling for the safety of her child (and there's no denying the abject kindertrauma of a ten foot tall werewolf grabbing a ten year old boy by the throat). BAD MOON was torn apart like an old shoe by critics back in the day but I think it was more of a bad timing thing than anything else. If you just imagine it's from 1986 rather than 1996 it starts looking a lot better, even charming.
As said above, BAD MOON is currently available to watch for FREE over at SHOUT FACTORY's pad HERE! If you enjoy it you should buy the Blu-ray too because it looks like they dug up a lot of interesting extra features including a commentary by director ERIC RED (who wrote the classic THE HITCHER!). Sure, at the end of the day, I wish BAD MOON showed a little more werewolf than it does but let's face it, there will never be enough werewolf for me. As is, it's a finer breed than it's usually given credit for and should provide a howling good time on a Sunday afternoon.
