Thor, a German shepherd of exceptional intelligence, is the true star
of Bad Moon. Thor goes on alert immediately when Ted (Michael Pare)
turns up at the home of his attorney-sister Janet (Mariel Hemingway),
a single mother with a 10-year-old son Brett (Mason Gamble), who has
fled Chicago to live in a house in a forest clearing somewhere in the
Pacific Northwest. When Ted says to Thor, "We're two of kind," he
isn't kidding.

In the pre-credit sequence we see Ted, a photojournalist on
assignment in a jungle in Nepal, bitten and mauled by a werewolf,
which kills Ted's lover. Plunged into a "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde"
predicament, Ted feels his only hope in resisting the blood lust that
keeps turning him into a werewolf is to receive the love of family.

Now Janet is a terrific sister and mother, capable, self-reliant,
warm and direct, but golly, right away five hideously mangled corpses
of hikers turn up in the forest. Only Thor senses the great danger
Ted poses for Janet and Brett.

In adapting Wayne Smith's novel "Thor," writer-director Eric Red,
much to his credit, plays "Bad Moon" straight. Sure, there are places
when you'll laugh out loud--what's a horror picture without a little
comic relief? "Bad Moon," however, is not camp, spoof or a homage to
earlier movies, although "Werewolf of London" (1935), starring Henry
Hull, is glimpsed on a TV screen.

Armed with passable special effects and makeup designs that in some
moments could have been more persuasive, "Bad Moon" is a straight-
ahead horror picture with exceptionally well-written characters and
well-directed actors.

Janet is a totally contemporary take-charge woman, and Hemingway is
outstanding in her portrayal. The same goes for Pare, playing a
decent man tormented by his losing battle with evil. Gamble's Brett
is a normal 10-year-old boy, upset and perplexed more by the
increasing tension and anger in his dog than by his uncle's mood
changes.

If any animal can be said to give an actual performance, then it is
the amazingly expressive Primo as Thor. "Bad Moon" is an
unpretentious, no-fuss kind of movie that you hope will find an
audience.