Original subtitles

-All right, Darcy, you win.

-You looked great. You were so scary.

-Welcome back to "The Last Drive-In"

on werewolf night. -Whoo!

-But I'm not entirely happy about what we're doing here,

to tell you the truth.

I mean, it's unfortunate,

but I think there's an international conspiracy

to turn werewolves into wimps. -What do you mean?

-Well, don't take this personally, Darcy.

But after "Dog Soldiers" came out in 2002,

all the subsequent werewolves over the last 20 years

have been less and less vicious.

They started making werewolf love stories, Darcy.

Love stories.

-Are you thinking of, like, "Underworld" and "Twilight"?

-Well, yeah, I'm including those.

Vampires have always been a little wimpy

because they're essentially poisoners.

They don't attack you directly.

They infect you.

So, yeah, both of those franchises involve

lame-o Lifetime movie of the week plots

where, sure, he's a vampire, but I love him.

And sure, he's a werewolf and he hates my vampire boyfriend.

But maybe I love him too.

I mean, they're supposed to be predators, Darcy.

They're supposed to be serial killers.

You shouldn't be hanging out at the mall with them.

-I think it all started with YA fiction.

-What's YA fiction?

-Young adult fiction, novels for teens.

-Well, of course it did.

Because what's the theme of young adult fiction?

-Love conquers all.

-Yes. Is that disgusting or what?

-You don't like love conquers all stories?

-No!

Love should not be able to conquer vampires and werewolves.

Especially not werewolves.

I mean, the Nazis had a werewolf division of their army.

They had an Operation Werewolf.

The Viking warriors, the berserkers,

they put on wolf skins and wolf heads before going into battle

so they could be vicious, uncontrollable, raging,

killing machines.

They didn't stop to ask the women

of Great Britain out on dates.

-I think we know what they did to the women of Britain.

-Yes. -Yes.

-Because they were in werewolf mode.

If you put on -- If you put a werewolf in a movie,

it's supposed to be like the giant shark in "Jaws."

It doesn't occasionally say, "Hey, you're so sweet,

I've decided to bring you home and serve you a muffin."

-I think the idea is that in the daytime,

they regret what they did at night.

-Yes. Because of Lon --

Lon Chaney Jr. did that in "The Wolfman" in 1941.

I get that,

but Lon Chaney Jr. couldn't control his murderous appetite

when he went full-out wolf.

-I feel like that story has love conquers all in it

because he can't kill Evelyn Ankers.

Even when he's a wolf, his love for her is too deep.

-I disagree.

-Well, I don't care.

-I think if Claude Rains doesn't beat him to death,

he rips out Evelyn's neck.

I would call that theme love conquers half.

Okay? Love conquers half in that case.

Love saps some of the killer's strength.

Anyway, my two favorite werewolf movies of the past 20 years

are "Werewolf Cop," of course --

that one almost attains a level --

that's almost as good as "Werewolves on Wheels," 1971,

biker gang that gets turned into a satanic cult.

In fact, I would say "Werewolf Cop"

has better werewolves than "Werewolves on Wheels."

And then the second movie is obvious.

-"The Wolfman" with Benicio del Toro?

-No. Hell no. "Strippers vs Werewolves."

-Mm. You make a good point. -It was okay.

Although the strippers, they didn't do that much stripping.

That was disappointing.

But what I'm coming up against with the millennial filmmakers

is that they don't get that shape--

Shapeshifting has to bring out the warrior self.

You don't shapeshift and turn into a computer programmer

shopping for sofas at Ikea.

-Why, whatever do you mean?

-The only explanation I've seen

that does make a little bit of sense is the idea

that werewolves historically were a way

to describe serial killers.

So, like Gary Ridgway. He's so normal.

He teaches Bible study. Works a regular job.

But then, whoops, there are those 84 women he kills.

So, yeah, he transforms at some point.

He becomes werewolfy.

And actually, there are quite a few cases

of serial killers claiming to be wolves in the 16th

and 17th centuries,

back when werewolfism was actually a crime.

It was on the books.

I guess it was easier to tell the authorities,

"Yeah, I made a deal with the devil

to murder some children," rather than say,

"I just enjoy the sound when I crush their brains,"

because the torture is less if you just say,

"Yeah, I made a deal with the devil."

And probably the shame is less if the devil is involved.

So they would just describe how they did it,

by either wearing a wolf skin or putting some kind of ointment

on their bodies that turned them into a werewolf.

Of course, once they confessed, they'd be burned at the stake.

Either way, they were going to be burned at the stake.

Probably the most famous one was the werewolf of Bedburg.

These cases tend to be in Germany,

and this turns out to be a guy named Peter Stubbe,

who would turn into a wolf at night and devour people.

He was arrested after some hunters claimed

they saw him shapeshift into wolf form,

and they tortured him,

and he confessed to killing animals and men

and women and children and eating their remains,

and this included two pregnant women

and their babies and his own son.

He also said he had an enchanted belt

that gave him the power to transform,

and he also said he had an incestuous relationship

with his daughter.

So he confessed to everything. -Apparently.

-So in 1589 they put him on one

of those giant wooden wheels.

You know, where you're spread eagle.

And they flayed his flesh with red hot pincers,

and they broke all his bones while he was still alive.

And then they hacked his head off

and put it on a pole in the town square

above the figure of a wolf,

while his body was still burning.

Is that cool or what?

They also executed his daughter and his mistress.

I'm not sure why they executed them.

Well, I think it's because they knew he was a werewolf,

but they still had sex with him.

-I mean, come on.

-And they didn't want them giving birth

to any werewolf babies, right? -It makes sense.

But do you actually have a point for this?

-No, I'm just saying I kind of understand it

if you use werewolves as a metaphor for serial killers.

But a lot of these elevated werewolf movies and books

and whatever, they go the opposite direction.

-What is the opposite direction?

-Well, they say they're using werewolves to make statements.

Actually, they don't even say werewolves.

They say lycanthropy.

"I'm using lycanthropy in the tradition

of the Navajo skinwalkers."

-What exactly are the Navajo skinwalkers?

-I have no idea, but we should ask the Navajo,

because I have lots of Navajo contacts

due to my extensive bolo tie collection.

Nobody can match the Navajo when it comes to, you know, making...

-I know. Sorry. -...badass bolo ties.

The Hopi come close. The Hopi.

Hopi bolos are close.

And the Zuni.

The Zuni can make bolos, but I'm Team Navajo.

-What does that have to do with werewolves?

-Nothing. -I know.

-That's just a shout-out to the Navajo silversmiths.

-Navajo! -So no,

My larger point is that I don't think werewolf movies should be

about body image issues, or our deep relationship with nature,

or our dysfunctional relationship with nature,

or achieving balance and reciprocity

between humanity and nature.

-What the hell are you talking about?

-Well, these are all phrases that people use

when they talk about werewolf movies.

-What people? What uses? No.

-Well, I mean, people that make --

people that make lycanthropy movies,

they talk about humans disrupting the ecosystem.

And so werewolves are counterbalance to that.

Werewolves being victims of white supremacy

and the boundaries between wilderness and culture

and city and country and werewolves

are modern representations of loneliness.

And the werewolves are about the horrors of pregnancy,

and werewolves are about the menstrual cycle.

And, you know.

-I don't know about any of that.

-Well, I think the menstrual cycle thing

is in "Ginger Snaps," which we watched, actually.

And doesn't she turn werewolf

because she has unprotected sex in the back seat of a car?

-I think so, yes.

-All right, I'll tell you what.

-Oh, no. -Listen to this.

-Okay.

-This comes from Dr. Kaja Franck,

visiting lecturer at the University of Hertfordshire.

Okay. "Using an eco-gothic lens,

we can perhaps offer other alternatives

to what the werewolf can give us.

What this hybrid monster can show us

is that being both is not scary."

Why would you not want to be scary?

You want to be scary, right?

You're a werewolf.

"It is a great opportunity for us to understand what humanity

and what wolfdom means and what these identities can offer.

For a long time,

wolves have been symbols of the ravaging

and rapacious wilderness, and then more recently,

they've been reclaimed as pure

and perfect symbols of this wilderness

that must necessarily remain untouched by human hands."

Okay, then there's a bunch of stuff here about

how wolves are both wilderness and civilization.

And then "I'm hopeful that in the future

we're going to see more positive transformations."

Was your transformation positive, Darcy?

-I feel like it was. -All right.

What would be a negative transformation?

"Well, I transformed into a wolf last night,

but damn, did that have some negative results."

You know? I guess this professor is saying

that the wolf should transform into a benevolent killer.

And the murders should be more like lethal injection,

you know, euthanasia.

Um, but anyway, she continues.

-Does she? -Yeah, yeah, yeah.

She says, "The other thing I would really like to see

is far more texts

where werewolves live alongside vampires and fairies."

-What? -Fairies?

"And they live alongside sea monsters and zombies.

For me, that reflects more truly what it is like living

in an intersectional and diverse society and a society

where we can be connected with a pluralism

via the Internet."

Can werewolves use the Internet?

-Yes, we can.

-"And that these monsters, these creatures that come from

specific identities and cultures,

have to learn how to live alongside each other,

much like we are doing today."

-Amen. -You know what that is?

That's "The Monster Club."

That's "The Monster Club" in 2025, right?

Remember how Vincent Price had that genealogical chart

of all the different varieties of monsters,

and they would dance together in the secret London club?

So basically,

what this teacher is saying is that werewolves are

the solution to diversity and inclusion.

If the werewolf can live peacefully

alongside all the other species, then so can we.

-And what do you think about that?

-I believe that werewolves should have

their heads blown off with shotguns.

-Or silver bullets. -Yes.

Without asking

"Will the werewolf regret this in the morning?"

-I feel like the stories need both.

-Wimps, Darcy.

Werewolves cannot be wimpy. And I know how all this started.

-And you're going to tell us right now.

-Yeah. -Okay.

-Started with tonight's movie. -Okay.

-Somebody said,

"Let's make a children's Hallmark movie starring a dog,

but let's put a werewolf in it.

And just enough graphic sex and gore

that children can't get into the theater."

-That's actually really accurate.

-"Bad Moon."

What we have here is the sensitive story

of a photojournalist named Ted,

who just wants to take some pictures

and aardvark with his girlfriend in the Nepalese jungle,

but gets viciously attacked by a werewolf instead.

Ted goes home and sets up an Airstream in the woods

to brood about his new nightly ritual of becoming hairy

and hungry, while occasionally murdering random day players.

Pretty soon, sister Janet invites him

to park his trailer next to her house,

thinking that being around her

and their 10-year-old son might make Ted less grumpy.

Only the family dog, Thor,

has figured out that Ted is a werewolf in his spare time,

so Thor keeps trying to warn Janet and Brett

that Uncle Ted is bad news,

but nobody believes him because he's a dog

who occasionally attacks traveling con men.

Sure, we've seen it before,

but have we seen it told from a canine point-of-view cam?

I think not.

Let's take a look at those drive in totals and get started.

We have...

Drive-In Academy Award nominations go to

Michael Paré as the tormented Ted,

who can't decide if he wants to save his family

or eat his family for saying "Things haven't been going

so good for me since I got back from the jungle."

Mariel Hemingway as Janet for proving she's a lawyer

by repeatedly wearing glasses and sitting on her bed

surrounded by papers, and for saying,

"Do not mess with a lawyer on her own turf."

Mason Gamble as Brett for his excellent pre-teen eye rolling

and for saying, "Uncle Ted, can I shoot the rifle?"

And of course, Primo, the German Shepherd, as Thor,

who runs five miles in three minutes

and steals the movie.

2 1/2 stars. Joe Bob says check it out.

-Yes.

-Did you ever hear of that Canadian wrestler billed

as The Wolfman and he looked like a wolf?

-I've heard of him, yeah.

-Vilmos Farkas. Willie Farkas, they called him.

He came from Hungary.

And the word Farkas in Hungarian means wolf.

and he would always be chained up,

and they would lead him into the ring on a leash.

The leash was controlled by Lou Albano,

his manager, because Darcy... -Yes.

-...he was raised by wolves in the Hungarian forest.

-That is awesome.

-That's what made him such a good wrestler.

-Zero doubt.

-If you put him in the ring

with vampires and fairies and sea monsters,

he would eat the entire four-man tag team.

-As he should.

-Wolves are badass. -You're telling me.

-They need the ecosystem for one thing.

Meat. -Meat.

-There's a trading post 35 miles northeast of here

in the great plateau.

Ten miles north of that is a landing strip.

We can have the film pouched out to Delphi,

then send it on to Calcutta.

Old Jonesy should be happy. We're only two weeks late.

-This has been such a wonderful adventure.

-You made it wonderful.

Hey. Mark it down in your book.

September, the Amazon. July, Egypt. Okay?

-But in the next five minutes, bed.

-No!

No!

-Ready, boy? Come on. Come get it!

Come on. You want the ball, Thor?

You want the ball? Yeah, come on.

Hey, you ready, Thor?

Come on, go get it! Go get it!

Bring it back, Thor.

Come on, Thor, come here!

Hey, Thor, come here, give me the ball.

Hey, Thor, come here!

Come back here, Thor! Come on, give me the ball.

Thor, come here!

I'm going to get you, boy!

Where you going, boy?

Where's the ball?

-Nice doggy.

Whoa!

Nice doggy.

You're a big one, aren't ya? Are you a dog or a horse, huh?

-It's not a horse. It's a German Shepherd.

Yeah?

Well, he's a hell of a big German Shepherd, ain't he?

-May I help you?

-You must be the lady of the house?

-Yes, I am.

-I see you got a young boy here.

Now, you help him get the best education possible?

Because I represent the Pacific Northwest Magna Reading Project

and we have a series of books which studies have proved

are a major benefit towards advanced learning in

phonetics and word comprehension.

Now, if I could have just five minutes of your valuable time

to show you this exquisite series,

I'm sure you won't be disappointed.

-Thank you very much, but we're really not interested

-in buying anything right now. -No, please. Please.

Let me show you these books my company has developed, all right?

I have them right...

...here.

-Whoa, whoa, lady, whoa! -Thor!

-Whoa, you ever heard of a leash law?

Jeez, want to control that dog before it bites somebody?

Thor!

Ah!

-Hey, Thor!

-Hey, get off him, Thor! -Get him off me!

Hey, go to the house! Go to the house, go on!

-Are you okay? -No, he bit me!

-Jesus! -Where did he bite you?

-You've got a dangerous animal there, lady.

I'm suing.

You better get hold of a lawyer right away, lady,

because you're gonna hear from mine, toot sweet!

-You can talk to me.

I'm a lawyer.

Thor, sit and stay down!

Did he bite you?

Because if he bit you, you really need

to see a doctor right away. Since you're on foot,

I'll drive you to the hospital emergency room myself.

-No.

-In fact, why don't I take you to my own family doctor?

-No, no, no, I got my own doctor.

-All right.

I've heard about enough, Flopsy.

-Who's Flopsy, Mom?

-A flopsy, Brett, is a con man who does things like

throw himself in front of cars and pretend to get hit

or intentionally provoke people's dogs

and pretend to get bitten.

He threatens to sue people or have their pets destroyed

if they don't pay him money.

I've prosecuted plenty of these guys.

Yeah, well, then, I'll see you in court.

-Brett, why don't you call Sheriff Bragg.

Tell him you're my son. He'll take the call.

Tell him we got a little problem up here and to send a deputy right away.

Well, Flopsy, it's been really nice knowing you.

I guess I'll visit you in the slammer.

-Oh, you --

-Stay!

My advice is to you is to turn around

and walk away without saying another word

and without looking back.

-Yeah? Well, you ain't heard the last of this, lady.

-Oh, I think I have.

But don't think of it as a total loss.

You learned a valuable lesson.

Do not mess with a lawyer on her own turf.

Good night, Thor.

-Lousy night shift.

...overtime.

Nah.

23.7.

-Hello?

Ted!

Hi, how are you?

Whereare you?

You've been back that long and you haven't called me?

You creep!

Of course, we'd love to see you!

Yeah, we'll be up to the lake in a few hours.

-I thought Uncle Ted was in another country.

-So did I.

He's been back three months and he didn't even call me.

That flaky brother of mine.

-Hey!

-Hey, sis. How are you?

-How are you?

Oh!

Ever think of using that razor I got you for Christmas?

-Yeah, maybe to slit my throat.

God it's good to see you, Janet, you don't know how good it is.

-Oh, that's right, that's why you've been back two months

and you don't call, you don't tell me

where you are, you don't ---

You putz!

It's good to see you, too.

-Hey, Brett, look at you. You shot up like a weed.

-Uncle Ted, can I shoot the rifle?

-Well, maybe we'd better talk about that later, okay?

Come on, let's go in and visit.

So, sis, how's it going at the new firm, Janeway and Samuels?

-So far, so good. My caseload's a lot lighter

than it was in the DA's office in Chicago.

Pace is a lot easier.

And, frankly, I am so glad to be out of criminal litigation.

-How are you adjusting to small-town life?

-For me, like that!

For Brett, it's not such an easy adjustment, though.

He hasn't made any friends in the neighborhood.

But Chicago's no place to raise kids.

Out here, it's safe and peaceful.

-You know, sis, I'm so proud of you.

I really have to take my hat off to you.

You're a full-time mom to Brett

and still manage to work at the firm full-time.

It's just great.

-Hey.

You're not telling me something.

-Things haven't been going so good for me

since I got back from the jungle, sis.

Marjorie's gone.

-I'm sorry.

-Yeah, so now it's just me and...

...my shadow.

-Whoa!

Oh, man.

What?

Whoa.

-Okay, that first scene where they're in Nepal,

that makes you think this is going to be

a hard-core slasher, right?

In fact, they had to cut some of that sex out

and cut some of the gore out to avoid getting an NC-17 rating.

They didn't go to the Himalayas, of course.

The Nepal scene was built on a stage in Vancouver,

and all those Asian natives,

including the guy who gets eaten by the werewolf,

they were employees at a Vietnamese restaurant,

but it was a pretty dang intense scene with Ken Kirzinger,

the stuntman who was Jason in

"Freddy vs. Jason" inhabiting that awesome werewolf suit.

-So isn't this the movie that you've always wanted?

-What? No.

-You're always saying

that you think Hallmark movies should have

some exploding heads, and then they'd be watchable.

-Well, that's my joke.

Yeah, but I take that back, though.

I get the impression

that Michael Paré as Ted and Mariel Hemingway as Janet

are acting in different movies.

She's the Hallmark single mom,

and he's calling his actor studio coach every night

to ramp up the intensity.

You know? -Some good kills, though.

-Yeah. Great kills.

And then they go back to the dog cam.

You know, it's Lassie goes to Crystal Lake.

-That was a good scene

when the door-to-door salesman gets owned.

-True.

That was a scene

to show that Mariel Hemingway is one tough cookie.

You know, which is kind of another Hallmark thing.

Anyway, the dead Marjorie from the opening scene

was played by an actress named Johanna Marlowe,

and she makes the sign of the twin guild anaconda

with Michael Paré

and then two full-frontal stuntwomen come in

and finish that part where she's eaten by the werewolf.

So the director there is Eric Red.

Eric Red is a New Yorker

who became semi-famous for his dark, gritty scripts.

He first got noticed when he wrote "The Hitcher,"

which was based on a real-life incident in Texas

when he was traveling across country on his way to L.A.

Rutger Hauer starred, Robert Harmon directed that,

and it was a minor hit.

And then he wrote two movies for Kathryn Bigelow, "Near Dark"

the vampire western, and "Blue Steel,"

with Jamie Lee Curtis as the rookie cop in New York.

Both of those were also minor hits,

but more importantly, they were noticed by the industry.

So he got his director's shot

with a movie called "Cohen and Tate,"

action thriller with Roy Scheider, based on

an O. Henry short story.

Didn't really get any kind of meaningful release,

but then he made "Body Parts"... -Nice.

-...sci-fi body-horror flick with Jeff Fahey,

Brad Dourif, Lindsay Duncan,

and then a Showtime movie called "Undertow" about a drifter

who gets washed off the road during a storm

and stranded in a house with a psychotic mountain man

and his beautiful wife.

And "Undertow" got a lot of attention.

So all the years he's climbing his way up the Hollywood ladder,

he's trying to get "Bad Moon" made.

It's a novel that he first read in 1991.

William Morris Agency was shopping it around,

and so he optioned it and he adapted it as a screenplay.

He wrote the screenplay himself.

The novel is told 100% from the viewpoint of the dog.

So obviously the dog does not see Ted's girlfriend killed

in a tent in Nepal by a werewolf.

And you'll notice as we watch the movie

that Red has three different camera views.

He has a dog cam,

he has a werewolf cam, and he has a God cam.

You know, the usual omniscient camera that sees everything.

He also has a little bit of a kid cam.

And the result, in my opinion, massive confusion.

-Is this a dog movie? Is this a kids movie?

Is this a watered-down slasher? It's all of the above.

So let's get back to it, and I think you'll see what I mean.

-But the dog is cute, and so is the kid.

-True. -Yeah. Is that a bad thing?

-Cute is for the elementary school play.

This is the kid who played Dennis the Menace.

Alright? -And?

-Did you see "Dennis the Menace"?

-No.

-He has trained professionally to be cute.

-Ah! Gotcha. -Alright, back to the movie.

-Okay.

-I have nothing against child actors.

I think all child actors should be devoured by werewolves,

each one in his own movie.

Do you notice in the movies

where the child acting is actually believable,

like "The Babadook"

and "Tigers Are Not Afraid" or "Satan's Little Helper"?

You know what those child actors all have in common?

-What? -They're not child actors!

They're just kids who make one movie.

-What about Jodie Foster in

"The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane"?

-Well, she was 13. -That's a kid.

-Well, she'd been in 50 TV shows and a dozen Disney films

by the time she was 13.

She was 13 going on 40. -Okay, maybe.

-I do commend Eric Red for making a movie that has animals,

children, full-frontal nudity, and werewolves.

I don't think that particular cocktail

has been ordered before or since.

-Good point.

-You know how they used to advertise "something

for the whole family" in those drive-in spots?

-Yes. -That's what this is.

Breast nudity and splatter scenes for Dad.

-Or Mom. -Plucky young female lead for Mom.

A brave little kid for the children

and a smart dog we can all relate to.

It's rated R, PG, and G. Just cover your kid's eyes

when Johanna Marlowe is riding Michael Paré

like a cowgirl on a rabid bull.

Yes. She was.

-You know, they have a sex toy called a Silver Bullet?

-I do.

-Sure. -I'm aware.

-Oh, well, I bet it was inspired by this movie.

-I feel like you're right.

-Oh, my God.

Thor!

Don't do that to me.

Yeah. Good dog, Thor.

Oh, shoot. -All right.

I was just wondering.

-I haven't seen him. -I wouldn't worry about him.

Hey, sweetie.

-Hey, Thor.

Come say hello to your Uncle Ted, Thor.

-That's our Thor. Overprotective.

Maybe if he saw you more.

-Come.

Come, come.

We're two of a kind, aren't we, old pal?

-What did you do, spit in his Alpo?

-He knows an old dog when he sees one.

Hey, you guys better get moving

if you want to get him home by bedtime.

You have a long ride ahead of you, sis.

-I want you to stay with us for a while, Ted.

-I didn't realize how late it was.

Come on. I'll walk you to the car.

-I mean it. I'm worried about you.

-Don't worry about me, come on.

-Just say yes. -Yes.

-Good. You're coming with us.

-No, but I'll come by soon.

-When?

-I'll call you. -This week.

-This week. -Good.

Come on.

Come on, Thor!

-Hello? -Sis?

-Hey, Ted, how are you doing?

-Yeah, you know...

...having you up here was really great, sis.

It really lifted my spirits a lot.

Frankly, sis,

you know,

it's everything.

It's everything.

I just wanted to tell you how much I appreciated

you know, your guys' trip up here and...

...family...

It's all we've got, sis.

-Is there a problem up there?

Problem?

Up here?

No, no problem at all.

Just, uh,

having you here, like I said...

...really lifted my spirits.

I reckon maybe you're right.

So I was thinking if it's not an imposition...

...maybe I can visit you for a few days.

-Oh, Ted, you know you're always welcome up here.

Here's what you're gonna do:

You're gonna park your Airstream in the backyard

and you're gonna live out of my fridge.

-Here's to family, sis.

-And having you right next door to me,

just like when we were kids. -It's just perfect, so nice

to be out of the woods, all the memories.

-I'm always right, little brother.

-Yeah, and it's really annoying. Always has been.

-Honestly, I'm glad you're here.

-Me, too.

Hey, Thor, come on, get out of there!

-Hey, hey, hey, Thor! Thor! Go on.

Handcuffs? Ted!

-Sis, it's not what you think. -What are these?

Oh, my, "Maximum Security High-Tempered Steel."

-It's not what you think. -Ooh, baby!

I think I better keep my eye on you.

It's gonna be real interesting having you around.

Come on. I'm gonna make dinner.

-No, thanks, I'm just gonna put on my sweats and go for a run.

I'm gonna keep a low profile tonight.

If that's all right with you?

-You can come and go as you please,

as long as you follow my rules.

Come on, Thor! Come on!

Good night, Thor.

What the hell?

Thor! What's going on?

Thor! What? What?

Okay. Come on. You want to go outside? Okay, go on, out, out!

Come here, boy!

Thor, where are you?

Thor!

Thor!

Thor, come on!

Hey, hey.

Good boy. Come on.

Let's go home. Come on!

Come on!

What's with you? Hey!

What? What?

Let's go home. Okay?

Thor, you're such a baby. Come on, come on, let's go.

Come on!

What? What's the deal with you? Come on, we've got to go home.

Jesus, ever heard of sleep?

You crazy dog!

Come on.

-You were at his funeral. -Yes.

You had quite a long relationship

- with your boyfriend Darnelle. - That's right.

We were together for three years.

For three years. And...

-Thor!

Come on! Let's go!

Come on, you love baseball.

Where are you going?

Thor! Don't do that!

Come here, Thor.

Get over here, you knucklehead.

That wasn't very nice.

-Now, they share their stories. -He came in and s--

We interrupt this program to bring you

this special KBDL news bulletin.

Teams of hunters and police are patrolling

a 50-mile square area in Timberline

as the curfew enters its third day.

Police revealed today the shocking

discovery of a fifth dead hiker

in the woods near Timberline.

The five men and women were mutilated

by what authorities believe is a wild animal.

Possibly a grizzly bear.

Teams of hunters and bloodhounds are patrolling

a 50-mile square area

and a curfew is now in effect on Timberline.

This is Sarah Williams reporting for KBDL.

-Hi, Thor.

-Come on, Thor.

Let's go.

-Hey, Ted, good morning.

-Good morning, sis.

-Why didn't you tell me about that curfew up in Timberline?

Those hikers who were killed?

That crazy animal that's loose up there?

I just saw it on TV.

There were police everywhere.

-Oh, uh...

that, I uh,

I was going to tell you about that this morning, sis.

-Well, I guess this means you'll have to stay

until they lift the curfew, huh?

-I guess.

-So you want some breakfast?

-Yeah, great.

-Okay.

-In good time, old boy.

In good time.

-Okay, Darcy, I've decided that you are right.

-Right about...

-I'm going to embrace the Hallmark horror genre.

-Yay. -In between breaks,

I sketched out a synopsis for the movie that I want to make.

"Bad Moon" is the first Hallmark horror.

This will take it one step further.

You want to hear it? -Go for it.

-Alright. The title of this movie

will be "Meat Pie Girlfriend."

-"Meat Pie Girlfriend."

-Yeah. You like that?

-Are you going to tell us the plot?

-Yes, but I'm just checking as to what

you would think if you saw that title on a poster

or a streaming menu or something.

-Are you kidding?

I am so there for "Meat Pie Girlfriend."

-Okay, good. Um, Jenna is a perky event planner...

-I'm liking it. -...recovering from

a broken heart who gets a new client,

handsome billionaire Nelson Winthrop. -Mm-hmm!

-But organizing Nelson's charity gala results in complications

because Nelson's secretary, Ashley,

is the girlfriend of Jenna's ex,

and Ashley is determined to sabotage the catering.

Should Jenna hack Ashley

into tiny pieces with the hatchet

she found in her son's backpack or should she hire the brutal

but strangely attractive street hustler Giovanni

to use his mob ties to pump six bullets into Ashley's brain

in return for having kinky sex with him three times a week?

He's cute, but not thatcute.

This is the middle act where she has to agonize.

-Got it. Yeah. -Alright.

Fortunately, the town Christmas play is coming up.

And Jenna --

Jenna is picked to play Mary, the mother of Jesus.

And the spirit of the season... -Stop!

-...causes her to realize that revenge is not the answer.

The answer was there all the time,

in the form of wacky neighbor Estelle

and her hungry cannibal family.

-Dude. Guaranteed -- -Yeah! Yeah!

-Guaranteed box office. Make it happen.

-How can it fail, right? -"Meat Pie Girlfriend."

It's on. Let's do it. -Alright.

-You want to be Jenna or Ashley?

-Fuck that.

I want to be the one that makes the meat pies.

-That's Estelle. -I want to be Estelle, baby.

-Okay. Interesting choice. That's bold, Darcy.

Thank you.

-And speaking of bold,

Michael Paré gives a bold performance in this movie.

He's ripped, he's focused, and he actually calls this

"one of the best performances I ever gave."

You know, I have great respect for Michael Paré

because he's one of those guys who studies acting

his whole life, trying to improve, trying to stay sharp.

And when I studied acting in New York in the early '90s,

I would run into these guys, actors in their 50s, 60s, 70s,

many of them already working on Broadway,

but they still went to class.

They went to class at least twice a week.

That is a New York tradition.

You just don't find that in L.A.

or really anywhere else except New York.

But I'm sure Michael Paré is one of those guys.

He is a member of the Actors Studio.

I'm not even an Actors Studio fan, but it does work for him.

So let's watch him do his thing.

Back to the movie.

And, Darcy, I think you ought to claim the Jenna role

because if we get a "Meat Pie Girlfriend 2,"

there won't be an Estelle role, so...

-It's an emotional choice. I'm not thinking about money.

It's art. -Alright, alright.

If making that meat pie means that much to you.

-It does. -Alright.

-Werewolf andcannibal. You are awesome, Darcy.

Thank you.

-Werewolves were often accused of eating babies,

which I guess would be considered cannibalism

since they're half human.

But I assume you would draw the line at eating babies.

Why aren't you answering me? -A wolf's gotta eat.

-Darcy, that's hard-core. -Just saying.

-Hey!

-It's not funny.

He's turning into the Wolfman.

I'm sorry, Brett, it's the full-moon part.

In movies, the guy only turns into a werewolf

during the full moon.

-Well, that's the way it works.

When there's a full moon, he turns into the werewolf.

Everybody knows that.

-But why only the full moon?

Why not any moon?

-Well, because that's the way a werewolf works.

You have to shoot him with a silver bullet.

-I bet if you blew his head off

with a shotgun, it would do quite nicely.

-Don't you know anything about werewolves?

-I know you turn into one if you get bit by one.

But the full-moon part...

Maybe there's different kinds of werewolves,

but it's been my experience that any moon will do the trick.

Werewolf-wise.

-Have you ever met a werewolf?

-I've been acquainted with a few in my time.

How about you?

Come on. Everybody knows there's no such thing as werewolves.

-Well...

There you go.

-Brett, will you take the trash out before breakfast, please?

-Aw, Mom. -Don't "Aw, Mom," me. Go.

-So, what all happened last night?

-I don't know really.

Thor thought he heard something in the woods,

practically threw a fit.

Woke up the whole house.

You know, you're lucky you were in the Airstream.

Anyway, I finally let him out.

He ran out into the woods and he didn't come back.

I tried calling him with that dog whistle

but he just kept barking.

-So...

What did he find?

-Nothing.

-What do you think it was all about?

-I don't know, really. I'm not that worried.

Thor barks at practically anything.

-I don't know, Janet.

You know, big predators, they can travel a long

distance if their habitat runs dry.

Just because there hasn't been anything dangerous

in this forest recently doesn't mean

it's always gonna be safe.

If I were you, I wouldn't let Brett

play out there for awhile until...

-Until what?

-There weren't supposed to be any wolves up where I am.

Look what happened to those people.

-I thought they said it was a grizzly bear.

-Janet, wolves, grizzly bears, I mean it's the same difference!

All I'm saying is you have to be a little more cautious.

Take the dog more serious

and don't let him play out there either.

-Don't you think you're overdoing it?

I mean, Thor isn't exactly helpless, you know.

-Janet, how big is that dog?

-Get this. he's 105 pounds.

-Do you know how big a gray wolf gets?

Try 200 pounds.

-Give me a break, Ted.

The dog starts barking in the middle of the night

and all of a sudden you've got a 200-pound wolf at the door!

Are you feeling okay?

-Piss off.

Hey, Janet!

Could you take your dog in the house, please?!

I'd like to go for a run.

-Come on, Thor!

Come on, it's bedtime!

Come on, Thor. Come on!

Thor, come on!

Thor, come on, it's bedtime! Come on in.

Come on.

Come on, come on. Good boy!

Hey. Hey, hey, hey.

Come here.

What's up with you? Huh?

Yeah, you be a good dog, huh?

You be a good dog.

Be a good dog. Yeah, yeah, I love you, too.

Good night.

-Hey.

What's wrong, boy?

You want to go out?

-Thor?

Hey, buddy.

Come here.

Come on.

Hey, what happened to you?

Oh, Thor.

Who cut you?

Oh, baby, who did this to you?

Come on, let's go clean you up.

Come on, it's okay. Come on.

It's alright. Come on, sweetie.

Come on.

It's okay, come on.

Join me.

No.

Everybody!

Viewers at home, open your windows.

Yeah!

-Ooh! -Are you mocking my people?

- I don't know. - Okay.

-One thing they did not try to economize on

is the practical effects.

That werewolf is all practical effects.

We saw a little of him

in this first confrontation between dog and werewolf.

But really, the more impressive scene

from an animal trainer point of view

is that stare-down scene outside the trailer.

How do you get a dog to stay that still and hold that stare?

Normally on a low-budget movie,

you would save all the werewolf effects for the finale.

But this movie was not really low-budget.

Eric Red had 6 million bucks to work with,

and he was surprised himself

because he thought he only needed $3 million.

But this was a Morgan Creek movie,

and Morgan Creek was a mini studio formed in the late '80s

that had churned out hit after hit after hit --

"Young Guns," "Major League,"

"Exorcist III," "Pacific Heights," "Robin Hood,"

"Last of the Mohicans,"

the Ace Ventura movies. -Yay!

-And so Eric Red kind of lucked out

when two fans of his "Bad Moon" script

both got hired as executives at Morgan Creek.

All those years, Red was taking the script around town,

they were among the few supporters

of what they called the "dog movie."

So now Bill Todman Jr. was head of production

and Larry Katz was head of development.

So Eric Red was given a green light, and he went out

and got Michael Paré and Mariel Hemingway as the leads.

And it was slated at 6 million bucks,

so he could do all the special effects

that he felt that he needed.

Unfortunately, the involvement of Morgan Creek

became a double-edged sword

once they realized it was basically a G-rated Disney film

with some R-rated scenes attached.

And Red said, "Morgan Creek hated the dailies of the film

during the entire shoot.

All I heard were calls about the terrible movie I was making

and how they wished they hadn't financed it."

-Aw. -So, and then adding to his woes

was the animal trainer who owned Primo the dog,

who was kind of the star of the movie.

Red had spent six months searching for the right dog.

There were lots of trained German shepherds

available in Hollywood,

but he wanted a dog with a kind of gentle, nurturing face,

and he finally found it in this photo

that was sent to him by a trainer of Primo.

But Primo was a puppy,

and so he had to go through intensive training

to get ready for the movie,

and they actually ended up using two other dogs

as doubles for the long shots and for the actual fighting.

For the wide shots when you couldn't see the dog's face,

they used a 12-year-old female named Echo,

and for the final fight scene,

they used a very vicious Russian attack dog.

The dog was so dangerous that they cleared the set

before he was brought out,

and three cameras were covered with Plexiglass

and the operators were enclosed in wooden boxes.

That dog had been used at the Russian border

and he was trained to fight.

At any rate, Eric Red didn't get along with the animal trainer.

He thought he was kind of bossy.

So only Thor knows that Uncle Ted is a werewolf.

But how can he get his message across to Janet and her son?

The dog's obsession with the werewolf...

well, it made more sense in the book

because it wasn't just a single mom situation.

There was a whole family --

Mom, Dad, three kids -- that Thor regarded as his wolf pack.

And so by the time the final script emerged,

two of the kids were gone

and only the boring middle kid remained.

And the book also had a ticking clock element

because that salesman from the first scene,

he was mounting a full-scale legal assault that could result

in Thor being taken to the pound or euthanized.

But all that suspense is gone from the movie.

It's just dog sniffs werewolf,

dog stares at werewolf, dog runs after werewolf,

and you don't really get the fact

that everybody is in imminent danger, including the dog.

All right, let's get back to the movie.

Roll it.

Doesn't make sense to me

that they would choose a German shepherd

because aren't German shepherds one-person dogs?

I mean, that's why -- That's why the Germans liked them.

They would do anything,

including sacrifice their own lives,

for their one human trainer.

And then when the Berlin Wall came down,

a lot of those dogs that guarded the wall had to be put down,

either because their handler was no longer there

or they would attack anything that moved.

You know? They're not known for their multi-tasking ability,

but do you think a German shepherd

would attack a wolf, though?

-To protect somebody? Yeah, totally.

-I mean, Michael Paré is right.

When he's sitting there with the kid

and they're watching "Werewolf of London" --

that's a great scene... -Yeah.

-...he points out that a wolf is twice the size

of a German shepherd.

-The dog would still do it.

-That's 'cause you love dogs.

-They're cooler than people.

-And yet you're a werewolf.

-It's a paradox. I don't know.

-Hi.

Yeah, this is Janet Harrison, 43 Oak Creek Lane.

Hi, Sheriff.

Ted? Are you in there?

Ted, you in here?

Ted?

Nice, Ted.

Oh, God.

-"December 28, 1995.

Stateside.

Saw a doctor here.

Had blood test.

Doctor couldn't identify strain.

Some infection that isn't in the books.

Had another blackout last night.

Woke up in the woods.

December 29, 1995.

Blacked out again. Woke in the woods.

Blood on me.

Not mine.

May 18, 1996.

I have tried all medical solutions to no effect.

There is no known cure in medicine...

but maybe...

just maybe, there's hope for me.

Janet and Brett came up to the lake today.

To see her again did my heart good.

She has invited me to stay with her.

And perhaps if I spend time with her, with my family...

this disease will go into remission.

Medicine will not stave off this disease.

But perhaps love, the restorative power of love,

family love...

will save me.

It's my last chance."

Nobody makes a fucking fool out of me, lady.

Here, doggie.

Here, poochie, poochie.

Come here, you frigging stupid dog.

Nice doggie.

-Sheriff, where have you been?

-Is this the man who approached your place last month?

-Yeah, it is.

-He's dead.

His name is Jerry Mills.

We found him on the road

a couple hundred yards from your house.

He bore the marks of an animal attack.

He'd been torn open by a big animal like a wolf or...

-Or a dog. Is that it?

-Yes, ma'am.

I do recall you told me the last time

Thor almost took a bite out of Mills.

Well, maybe last night when Mills came back,

Thor went at him again.

-Thor got in a fight last night...

with something or...

someone.

He's got cuts all over him.

-I see.

You know about these slayings up in the Timberline area, the...

...those hikers that were killed?

-Yes, Janet.

That wouldn't be the same animal that killed Mills.

It would've had to travel 200 miles

from Timberline to get here.

-That's not what I mean.

My question is...

is it possible that...

they were committed by a human being?

-No chance at all, Janet.

They were done by a big animal.

No man could tear a person apart

the way the beast that butchered those people did.

The same with Mills last night.

Wolves are the probable culprits.

Very, very big wolves, but not a man.

Not humanly possible.

Why did you ask?

-I don't know.

-I reckon that's all for now, Janet. I'll be in touch.

-Thanks.

-Just one thing.

I know you love Thor.

And if he did tear up Mills, he was doing so to protect you.

But once a dog becomes a biter, gets a taste for human blood,

he becomes dangerous.

I suggest you consider shopping for another hound.

Good morning, there, big guy.

How are you doing this morning? Huh?

Want to go outside, Thor, huh?

Want to go outside? Come on.

Right to the Airstream.

Where were you last night, Ted?

-I went for a run.

-All night?

You didn't see anything?

Hear anything?

-Get him off me!

-No! Don't!

Get in the trailer!

-No, Thor! Stop it!

Janet, get him off!

Thor, get off!

-Aah! Aah!

-Thor, no!

Get in the house! I can't hold him back!

Thor! Come on!

Come on! Come on! Come on!

Thor, come on! Bad dog! Bad dog!

Stop it, Thor! Come on! Calm down!

Get in there!

Come here, Thor.

Come on, sweetie. Come on.

Come on. It's okay. It's okay. I'm sorry.

-Come on. Come on.

-I'm sorry, babe.

Go on, it's okay. -All right. Hold his head.

-It's okay, Thor. It's okay. Go on.

-Okay. Good boy.

-I got him. I got him.

-Thor! Come back!

-Thor, come back! -Brett, come here.

Come on, sweetie. They have to take him.

There is nothing we can do about it.

-Don't go!

They'll kill him!

-They have to take him, Brett. He is dangerous!

-No, it's not true, Mom! It's not true!

Thor!

Thor!

Thor! Let go!

Mom, they're gonna kill him!

He's gonna die!

Let go!

-I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

It's okay.

Come on.

It's okay.

-Come on! Come on!

-I know.

It's okay.

-Do you know that people actually tear up

when the animal control people come to take Thor away?

I know this from reading the online reviews.

So if this makes you feel any better,

you should know that the two animal control officers

using those rope-on-a-stick thingies

to keep control of Thor --

Those are Thor's trainers.

So Thor knows he's acting throughout that scene.

What do you think, Darcy?

-It is always so hard to watch

when they use those control poles.

-Is that what you call them? Control poles?

Lasso on the end of a stick? -I guess. Yes.

-What I found hard to watch is, Janet goes into the trailer,

basically breaks into Ted's trailer when he's not home,

goes through his stuff. And, um, by the way,

would you keep a picture of the mangled dead body

of your girlfriend in your trailer?

And then she reads his journal.

So we get journal exposition.

You know, he went to the doctor, he had a blood test.

They can't identify the blood type.

He has blackouts.

He wakes up with other people's blood on him.

But here's the best part --

He thinks his werewolfism might be curable by,

"the restorative power of family love."

What do you think, Darcy?

Can the restorative power of family love

turn a werewolf back into a normal human?

I doubt it.

-What's truly terrifying,

though, is that this movie looks so much

like a Hallmark feel-good special,

right down to the overly dramatic music,

that they just might do that.

You know, I wouldn't be surprised

if the movie ended with a group hug and a prayer,

thanking God for sending so much love into the family

that the werewolf DNA couldn't stand it

and spontaneously burned up and removed all werewolf traits

and turned Ted into a fun-loving uncle

who brings toys at Christmas.

But, damn, voiceover journal entries as a way

to tell us that Uncle Ted is struggling with his wolfiness?

And this is from one

of the hottest screenwriters in Hollywood?

I almost expect him to say, "Dear Diary," you know?

I haven't talked about Mariel Hemingway yet,

though, other than to say that she's the perky mom.

So Mariel Hemingway is the perky mom.

Thank you for clarifying.

-I don't want to say she's phoning it in

on this one, but... -She's phoning it in

on this one. -All right. Well, thank you.

I mean, there's not much to the role.

The lead in the movie is the dog.

The second lead is a 10-year-old boy.

The third lead is an intense werewolf.

She's number four.

So she's basically in the movie

because you can't have a 10-year-old boy in the film

unless he has at least one parent.

So yeah, she's there for exposition.

So we can't blame her that much for not standing out.

But Eric Red was not kind to her.

He went out of his way to say that she was,

"limited as an actress."

He said she couldn't really deliver the emotion

that he wanted when she was supposed to be scared.

Um, it would seem, though, that she would find that easy,

since she was born

into the famously dysfunctional Hemingway family,

all the descendants

of the famous novelist Ernest Hemingway.

Her family tree is full of alcoholism, suicide,

schizophrenia, but she's sort of the normal one.

Um, Ernest Hemingway is her grandfather,

and her film debut at age 14 was in "Lipstick,"

the movie that starred her older sister Margaux.

But her breakout role was in Woody Allen's "Manhattan"

at the age of 18,

and that resulted in an Oscar nomination

for Best Supporting Actress.

And then she starred in "Personal Best" as a track star.

She starred as Dorothy Stratten in Bob Fosse's "Star 80."

She had roles in "Creator, "Superman IV."

But the real drama was at home,

where her sister Muffet had a drug problem

and a mental health problem,

and her sister Margaux committed suicide at the age of 38.

And Mariel later wrote about her formative years,

and she said, from the age of 7, she was the family "fixer."

She would clean up after the drunken parties

so that nobody would feel sad in the morning.

Um, and Margaux, by the way,

was the last of seven suicides

in that extended Hemingway family, including, of course,

Ernest Hemingway himself.

And the way she got the name Mariel

is that that was the name of Hemingway's

favorite fishing village in Cuba.

So apparently you can't escape the Hemingway name.

By the time of this movie,

though, she had settled into a fairly solid acting career.

She was nominated for a Golden Globe

as a lawyer in the "Civil Wars" TV series,

starring opposite John Mellencamp in a movie

called "Falling from Grace."

So I doubt that playing the mom in a werewolf movie

was much more than a paycheck job.

Anyway, Morgan Creek was breathing down Eric Red's neck.

Eric Red was being mean to Mariel Hemingway

to try to get a performance out of her.

He admits, making her, "hate my guts,"

so that she would get more emotional.

And while all of that is going on,

the cute little dog that Eric Red chose from a photo

turns out to have A.D.D. His attention span is so short,

they sometimes have to shoot 50 close-ups --

and I'm not making up that number -- to get one good one.

And now Thor is in the city pound.

But I think we all know there's no way he's gonna stay there.

So roll the flick. Go.

-Is that a good thing or a bad thing

to be named after a fishing village?

-Well, it's good 'cause it's one of her father's good memories.

-Actually it's not.

It was her grandfather's good memories.

And then her father was memorializing the experience

of her grandfather,

like, "Remember that blue marlin that Grandpa caught?

Well, that's what I thought of the day you were born."

So

-Fine. It's not a good association.

-I mean, she did become a supermodel,

so presumably she knew she didn't look like a blue marlin.

But, you know.

-You can't assume that. Supermodels are self-conscious

like everyone else.

-You know those people

who came across the Straits of Florida

trying to set foot on America and get a green card from Cuba?

They call them Marielitos

because they board the boats in Mariel.

-Hmm. Fun fact.

-I am just full of Cuban fishing village lore.

-Of course you are.

-It's probably genetic.

It happens with shepherds. It's the way they breed them.

-Thor's pedigreed.

It doesn't happen to pedigrees.

-You're gonna have to see a doctor for that.

-No, I won't. It's just a flesh wound.

No veins or tendons were cut. Nothing I can't take care of.

-You're gonna need a tetanus shot.

-I can give myself a tetanus shot, Janet.

-Excuse me a second.

-I'm sorry about your dog, son.

Come here.

Come here!

There'll be other animals in your life.

-Brett.

Brett.

It's time for bed.

-I'll be right up.

-I guess I'll turn in, too.

-Ted.

-Yes, Janet?

-If I ask you a question...

...will you tell me the truth?

-Of course.

-Where's Marjorie?

-Seattle.

-Come on!

Oh, shit!

Hey, Thor!

-Company?

Just what I came here to get away from.

Sis?

Janet?

-Is it you? -Yeah, Ted.

What the hell's going on?

-Playing Nancy Drew, are we, sis?

You caught me at a rather awkward moment.

I was just about to...

restrain myself.

But now that you're already here,

that might be somewhat pointless.

-You're gonna come clean with me right now!

Family love, Janet.

I thought it could save me, but I was wrong.

But, hey, we all make mistakes!

You sent the dog to the pound, Janet.

I warned you.

I told you I shouldn't be here, but you wouldn't let me go.

You wanted to play big sister.

You had to be right.

You always have to be right, Janet,

but this time you're wrong!

You should have listened to the dog, Janet.

He was trying to protect you.

-Ted?

-Handcuffs, Sis, I was going to use these on myself.

-Can you believe that? -What's happening?

-They -- They were supposed to keep people

from finding out about my...

private affair.

My mistress.

-Oh, my God.

-But, you...

You already know, don't you, sis?

-Yes, you know.

The handcuffs won't keep my little secret

a secret any longer.

Come back here!

You stupid bitch!

-Pretty dang cool transformation,

but it seems like Uncle Ted

goes pretty quickly from, "Family love

might be able to save me,"

to, "Come back, you stupid bitch."

There's some CGI in the middle of the practical

that doesn't really work,

but, otherwise, this is a good setup for the finale.

And I'm wondering, though,

why Janet is in the woods in the first place.

She knows it's dangerous because she considers taking a gun.

She knows that Ted lied to her about Marjorie.

She knows he's a werewolf,

so why would she be confronting him?

My favorite line is, "You always have to be right, Janet.

I warned you not to let me be here.

You should have listened to the dog."

But there still doesn't seem to be enough there

for him to be an actual danger to Janet and Brett.

Thor? Yes, he hates Thor. He even pees on Thor's house.

That's a great moment. But they should have --

They should have been more careful with the rules.

They don't make Ted sympathetic or unsympathetic.

They don't really reveal his exact place in his family.

He's just struggling with his werewolfdom.

Um, I'm going to take Michael Paré at his word

that he considers this his best performance,

but he had some other great ones.

Michael Paré actually set out to be a chef.

His only formal education prior to acting

was at the Culinary Institute of America,

and he still likes to cook for his directors

and his co-stars and anybody else he works with.

He was working as a chef in his native New York City

when Joyce Selznick, the legendary agent

and casting director,

discovered him and made the stereotypical,

"Listen to me, kid."

You know? "Do what I say and I'll make you a fucking star.

I took Tony Curtis off the streets of the Bronx,

and I can do the same thing for you."

And she kind of did that.

She got him 30 episodes as a punk high school student

on the ABC series "The Greatest American Hero,"

and she got him his first movie lead as Eddie Wilson in "Eddie

and the Cruisers."

But then she died

and he never really found anybody to replace her.

So at the age of 22, he's making $225 a week,

working six days a week, 12 hours a day in a restaurant.

By the age of 24,

he's making a million bucks a year

doing movies like "Streets of Fire" for Walter Hill,

"The Philadelphia Experiment."

But he's drowning in Hollywood, kind of aimless.

Um, listen to this quote from Michael Paré --

"Joyce loved me and took care of me,

but after she died, I needed a tough-guy, thug manager.

I needed somebody to say, "Listen, just fucking do this.

Get your ass to class, get to diction class,

go to martial arts class, go to the gym.

Don't be hanging around trying to figure life out.

This is it.

Just work on your craft and stay healthy.'

That's what I needed.

And nobody would do that.

It was like, 'It's okay, he's crazy.

He's a wild rock star and he can do what he wants.'"

And these guys burn quick.

And the reason everybody thought he was a wild rock star

is that everybody thought he was Eddie Wilson in "Eddie

and the Cruisers," because he lip-synced that music video,

which was the song "On the Dark Side" by John Cafferty

and the Beaver Brown Band.

Michael Paré was not a singer.

He had no musical experience.

He just looked like a rock star.

And so he was treated like a badass.

He was actually just a really committed actor

who treated acting like a sport. You got to go out there

and take batting practice and field 200 grounders a day,

or you lose your edge.

So he starred in "Houston Knights" -- CBS police series

alongside Michael Beck.

He made "World Gone Wild" with Bruce Dern.

He made a lot of money doing Japanese commercials.

He did "Village of the Damned" for John Carpenter,

and somehow he ended up living in Holland,

when he got the call for this movie,

and so he flew to L.A.,

met with Eric Red on the Warner Bros. lot.

And he loved the script so much,

especially the idea of transforming into a werewolf,

that he said, "What do I have to do to be in this movie?"

And Eric Red said, "Just say yes."

And by then he was hardcore Actors Studio.

And when Red told him, "Look,

it's going to take four hours to put that makeup on

and the prosthetics on you in order to be the werewolf,

and it's going to take at least that long to take it off,

and we need to shoot 12 hours a day

so that means you're going to need to sleep in the trailer

for four days,

and it's not going to be very much sleep at all."

And he said, "I would do that for 10 days.

That is totally worth it."

And so the result is what we're going to watch right now.

Best part of the movie by far.

And remember, the stunt double for Thor in the fight

is a Russian attack dog that was huge and trained to kill.

And the guy who gets attacked at the moment of impact

is stunt coordinator Ken Kirzinger,

who was a big man,

which makes the fact

that he gets thrown all the way across the room

all the more remarkable.

So have a good time before we go back to the Hallmark ending.

Roll it.

-Deep family love didn't cure him, Darcy.

-No, it did not.

-Are you disappointed?

-I don't think I've ever seen a curse reversal.

-You mean somebody gets bitten and they go full wolf

and then they revert to normal?

-Yeah, exactly.

I don't think so.

-Well, that's another good Hallmark plot

that we have to do.

Or werewolfism could go into remission,

or the werewolves could go to counseling.

They could all go to werewolf rehab --

W.A.

And they sit around and tell each other, "One day at a time,"

and they give their testimonies about being a werewolf.

"I haven't chewed on a human in 340 days."

"Keep it up, Bill." You know?

"I ate the dog."

"Well, that's okay. You're on the road to recovery."

And then occasionally somebody comes in with, "Okay,

I ate my cousin last night and I'm feeling terrible about it."

"Okay, Stu, we understand. You made a mistake.

Was the cousin underage? Okay. All right.

Good. All right. We'll deal with it.

Group hug."

-Thor, I'm gonna get you out.

Come here. Come on.

-Aah!

-Come here, Thor. All right, Thor, come on.

Come on, you're free. Let's go.

Aah! Aah!

-Thor, we gotta get out of here.

Oh, yes!

Aah!

-Brett! Brett! Brett!

Aah!

-Ma!

Mom!

Get the fuck off my son!

Do it.

Finish it.

-Hey, there, big guy.

You saved us.

You're our hero, Thor.

Yeah.

Oh, Thor.

You're a good dog.

-Mom, is everything okay?

-Yeah.

Yeah, everything's okay.

Everything's okay.

Gee, Thor, hello.

Come here.

-I actually think that would have been a great ending.

Thor turns into a werewolf,

but alas, it's only a dream and Thor gets head rubs

from his loving owners.

That last fight scene starts in the Olympic National Forest,

moves to the house,

includes a frantic chase through the street

with Bret on his bike and Thor evading automobiles,

and moves back out of the house to the front lawn

and ends up back in the forest.

That sequence took four days and used live animals,

attack dogs, stuntmen, stunt women,

multiple werewolf suits, special makeup effects,

animatronics, dog dummies, pyrotechnics,

other physical effects, and a whole lot of blood.

So to get ready for the fight scenes,

Michael Paré would play Johnny Cash's

"The Beast in Me" in his trailer.

There were two geniuses involved

in the special effects department.

Steve Johnson built that huge, convincing,

imposing werewolf, shaggy,

barrel chested, huge headed, articulated jaws.

Usually you can only show the werewolf in short bursts,

but this werewolf could definitely take a close up,

right, Darcy?

-He is beautiful.

-My problem with the movie involves the writing,

which is strange because that's what Eric Red is known for.

Was Ted a sociopath prior to getting infected?

We don't really know.

And so we can't like him as much as we might otherwise.

There's no real affection between Ted and Janet,

or between Ted and Brett,

and the close relationship Ted had with the dog

before he went to Nepal --

we know this from the book -- is not shown or even hinted at.

Why does he go out every night instead of

just full moon nights?

In other words,

why not make him more sympathetic

so the dog is confused about the right thing to do?

And also, we can't really believe

that family love is going to save him

when he doesn't seem to like his family that much.

Plus, we never see him grieve for his girlfriend or rail

against what fate has done to him,

or really address the big issue in his life at all.

What do you think, Darcy?

-It has some really cute moments,

and it has some scary moments,

but I would have liked to see you more werewolf and less dog

if I'm going to be real.

-Michael Paré would go on to a long career.

Still working today.

Has been in every kind of movie imaginable,

from "Hope Floats" to "The Virgin Suicides"

to a Chinese television series set in Las Vegas and Saipan.

He's been in every Uwe Boll movie.

That's something nobody else can say.

And he has very interesting opinions about film.

For example, he's a great admirer of Anthony Ferrante,

the director of the "Sharknado" films,

and he thinks somebody should give Ferrante a big budget.

But anyway, Paré has had more than 300 performances

since he was plucked out of that restaurant

by Joyce Selznick.

And Mariel Hemingway also remains busy.

She works in both TV and movies

while living on top of a mountain in Malibu,

and lately, she's been producing family movies.

Ernest Hemingway's "A Moveable Feast",

a documentary called "Sisters Hemingway",

and a series about her famous grandfather's life

in Cuba in the 1950s.

Mason Gamble, who played Brett,

worked a few more years before he hit that brick wall

that most child actors encounter.

He had started his career with a small role in "Groundhog Day"

when he was 7.

He starred in "Dennis the Menace"

opposite Walter Matthau.

the same year, but he was not used in the sequels.

He had roles in Leslie Nielsen's

"Spy Hard" and Wes Anderson's "Rushmore",

and his busiest year was probably 2001,

when he appeared in multiple episodes

of the TV series "Kate Brasher".

At the age of 24, he retired from film and enrolled at UCLA,

where he got advanced degrees in marine biology.

Eric Red would continue to work as a writer and a director,

despite filing for bankruptcy twice, in 1995 and 2001.

He wrote and produced the HBO western "The Last Outlaw",

starring Mickey Rourke.

He directed a supernatural thriller called "100 Feet".

He made a TV movie called "Night of the Wild".

He created a graphic novel called "Containment"

that became a comic book series.

He was fairly bitter about his treatment by Morgan Creek,

which released "Bad Moon" in 900 theaters,

but they released it on the day after Halloween in 1996,

and in his opinion, they gave it absolutely no support.

Made about $1 million worldwide on a $6 million budget.

In the year 2000,

Eric Red sent his Jeep Grand Cherokee crashing

through a bus stop and into a bar on Wilshire Boulevard

in LA and killed two people.

And at the accident scene, he picked up a shard of glass

and attempted suicide by slitting his own throat.

He recovered from that,

and he escaped prosecution after claiming

that the whole incident happened during a blackout,

but he lost this drawn out wrongful death suit

after a judge determined that he had acted intentionally in

a, quote, "fit of uncontrollable rage."

Um, so then his latest movie, "Night of the Wild",

which is about a meteorite that burns --

that turns dogs into vicious killers,

is an asylum release which premiered on SyFy

about 10 years ago.

One more reason I don't like to drive in LA, Darcy.

-Dude, that is mind boggling. -Things like that can happen.

All right.

-But here's something that will make you happy.

-Really? Okay -Yes. Hold on.

This one has a gift inside.

-Okay. I like the ones with gifts.

-I know.

-And -- Oh, wow.

It's my very own copy of "Snakehead Swamp."

-You're welcome!

Because it's from the screenwriter of

"Snakehead Swamp", Greg Mitchell.

-All right.

-"Dear Joe Bob, enclosed herein is a copy of 'Snakehead Swamp',

the first SyFy Channel original

I wrote back in the heyday of the SyFy Channel.

Saturday night creature features.

To date, I believe it is the greatest movie ever made

about genetically engineered voodoo killer fish.

And I'm immensely grateful I had the opportunity to work on it.

It co-stars the iconic Antonio 'Huggy Bear' Fargas

and is a real hoot.

Though I could be biased.

I'd love to know if you have ever met him."

I do have a Huggy Bear story, but this is a long letter,

so I better not tell. -Tell the story.

-"I very much appreciated your Sharknado episode.

It was a real delight seeing you turn the spotlight

on that particular sub-genre of B-movies.

I can't speak for all those shows,

but I know that on the ones I worked with,

we had a total of two weeks

principal photography with the weekends off.

And while many look down on those movies

for their inherent cheapness,

I'm actually pretty proud of what everybody was

able to accomplish with such insane constraints

on time and budget.

Everyone worked hard,

and while they didn't take themselves too seriously,

they always took the work seriously,

helping to put out some fun summer entertainment

for the creature loving audience.

Seeing that recognized by 'The Last Drive In'

felt like a good validation.

So thank you guys for that."

Okay, and then Greg goes into some stuff here

about meeting me at a convention in Little Rock

and going to the Memphis Jamboree.

-It's a lot. -And when I met you,

I was still grieving the loss of my friend Zach.

Um, who, for all intents and purposes,

had been my own personal horror host.

Um, I know my story is only one of thousands

you've received over the years about

how you have made a difference,

both big and small, in the lives of the people you've touched.

You have provided a welcoming home for us mutants

in your very cramped trailer,

and have taught us so much about movies and yes, life.

I can't imagine you thought horror host would be

your life's calling.

Ha-ha.

But I thank you for accepting that call.

It's made all the impact in the world.

Hey, hey, in the hayloft, indeed.

All the best, Greg Mitchell, Paragould, Arkansas.

He's talking about some comparisons I made to my life

and the plot of "Sullivan's Travels."

That "Hey, hey, in the hayloft part."

Anyway, thank you, Greg, for sharing your story with us

and especially for sharing the brilliance of "Snakehead Swamp"

with us.

But I would like to say that if my obituary

or my gravestone says "horror host" on it,

I'm good with that.

People can relate to that.

A lot of stuff I do, people cannot relate to.

So yeah, we should have more horror hosts

and fewer cable news hosts.

The world will be a nicer place, in my opinion.

Anyway, what do you think of "Snakehead Swamp", Darcy?

-I have not seen it yet. -What?!

-Sorry! -You haven't seen it?

Are you kidding me? -No.

-Tomorrow night, you're watching it.

-I will watch it soon. -Yes, soon. Tomorrow night.

And that's it for me, Joe Bob Briggs, speaking for

myself, and Darcy the mail girl,

when I say that whenever you have an election and

some dude wins, who's as useless as a donkey dick, don't get mad.

Just remember that fair is a place where they judge pigs.

-All right. -Oh, I get it.

-Too many metaphors. -I get it.

-Too fast. -I don't --

-For some people, yes. -All right.

-I'll tell you what does make sense.

-Okay. -The drive in will never die.

Silas.

-What? Oh, no.

-Silas went to see his friend Hatfield,

who was dying in the hospital, and as Silas stood by the bed,

the frail Hatfield got worse and worse,

and then he started waving his arms,

gesturing frantically for something to write on.

And so Silas handed him a pen and a paper,

and Hatfield used his last ounce of strength

to scribble down a note.

As soon as he finished that note, he died.

So Silas put the note in his pocket.

He was unable to read it in his grief.

And a few days later,

Silas was talking to Hatfield's family at the funeral,

and he realized he still had that note in his pocket,

in the pocket of his jacket, so he announced to the family,

"Hatfield handed me this note just before he died,

and I haven't read it yet.

But knowing him,

I'm sure there's a word of inspiration for all of us."

And then he unfolded the note, and he read it out loud.

"You're standing on my oxygen tube."

All right, all right. Alright.

I'm going to try again. Okay?

90 year old woman bursts into the men's day room

at the nursing home, raises her clenched fists in the air,

and says, "Anybody who can guess what I have in my hand

can have sex with me tonight."

Man in the back shouts, "An elephant!"

The woman thinks for a minute and says, "Close enough."

-I'll take it. I'll take it.

-♪ We are drive-in mutants

-♪ Drive-in mutants ♪

-♪ We are not like other people ♪

♪ We are sick -♪ Sick ♪

-♪ We are disgusting -♪ Disgusting ♪

-♪ We believe in, yeah, we believe in ♪

-♪ Blood ♪

♪ And breasts ♪

♪ And beasts ♪

-♪ Yeah, we believe in ♪

-♪ Blood ♪

♪ And breasts ♪

♪ And beasts ♪

-♪ If life had a vomit meter ♪

♪ We'd be off the scale -♪ Off the scale ♪

-♪ As long as one drive-in remains on the planet Earth ♪

♪ We will party like jungle animals ♪

♪ We will boogie till we puke ♪

-♪ Boogie till we puke ♪

-♪ The drive-in will never die ♪

♪ We will boogie till we puke ♪

-♪ Boogie till we puke ♪

-♪ The drive-in will never die ♪

-♪ We believe in ♪

♪ Blood ♪

♪ And breasts ♪

♪ And beasts ♪

-♪ We believe in ♪

-♪ Blood ♪

♪ And breasts ♪

♪ And beasts ♪

-♪ Yeah, we believe in ♪

-Made in Georgia.