Full Moon High (1981) – Film Review

Director: Larry Cohen
Cast: Adam Arkin, Roz Kelly, Ed McMahon
Certficate: 15

By Sarah Morgan

There was clearly something in the air in 1981 – and not just a full moon. That was the year in which An American Werewolf in London, The Howling and Wolfen were released, all of which featured a lycanthrope as a central character.

There was another too that slipped a wee bit under the radar. Unlike the aforementioned trio, Full Moon High wasn’t really a horror movie, it was an out-and-out comedy which adopted a few tropes of the genre. It was also something of a family affair for the Arkin clan.

“Lack of control”

Adam Arkin, who viewers may recognise from his stints in Northern Exposure and Chicago Hope, takes the lead role of teenager Tony Walker who, during a trip to Romania with his father, is bitten by a werewolf. Lo and behold, when the full moon next rises, Tony gets all hairy and develops a taste for raw meat.

Deciding it would be best for those he cares about if he moved on, Tony vanishes, but reappears 20 years later. As his ageing process has stalled, he passes himself off as his own son and re-enrolls at high school, where he catches the eye of teacher Miss Montgomery and salacious female student Ricky. He’s also targeted by an old flame who is now married to his former best friend-turned-cop.

Tony’s lack of control over his behaviour means that more attacks occur, and he’s eventually captured and locked up. However, he escapes and takes to the football field, where his hopes of being the star performer in an important game look set to be ruined.

Arkin is joined in the cast by his father, Alan, an acclaimed actor with a string of fine performances behind him in the likes of Catch-22 and Wait Until Dark; he eventually won an Oscar for his role in Little Miss Sunshine. A star at the time, Arkin Sr maybe signed up for this low-budget outing as a favour to his eldest son; he certainly provides one of its highlights playing a psychiatrist who adopts a ruthless tough-love approach to his patients. There’s also a small role for Alan’s youngest son, Anthony, who plays one of the match’s spectators.

“Sharp lines”

The film is a game of two halves. The first was somewhat hackneyed with a heck of a lot of misfiring gags, but the second is a real hoot, mostly thanks to Arkin Sr and some sharp lines from writer-director Larry Cohen.

The make-up effects aren’t up to the same standards as those in, say, the aforementioned An American Werewolf in London, but as this is a comedy that doesn’t necessarily need any roots in reality, it scarcely matters.

Full Moon High provided the final live action role for tragic actress Elizabeth Hartman; it’s lovely to see Cohen’s biographer, Michael Doyle, pay tribute to her while discussing the film in a talk among the special features, during which he also explores how the film was influenced by 1950s movies such as I Was a Teenage Werewolf before possibly inspiring the 1980s ‘classics’ Teen Wolf and its spin-offs.

Sarah Morgan( Writer )

Sarah Morgan studied film journalism at post-graduate level with the BFI and has been writing about TV and film for PA Media’s newspaper, magazine and new media customers since 1996. She’s also written for a wide range of other publications, both online and in print, including the book Offbeat and Intermission magazine, and is a regular contributor to the Talking Pictures TV podcast. When she isn’t watching movies, she’s collecting and reading vintage crime and horror paperback books or, for her sins, watching her beloved Sheffield Wednesday.

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