When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

Larry Cohen is one of the big horror names and I've been meaning to get to his movies for quite some time. Never caught his "It's Alive" trilogy, nor "Q" or "God Told Me To" but as a horror nut; I'll get to them eventually. Perhaps "Full Moon High" isn't the best introduction into Larry Cohen the director. Adam Arkin gives his all as a teenager who's bitten by a wolf in Romania and his life falls apart soon after. Father dies (quite a funny scene though) and he fulfills his destiny; roaming the earth for a great deal of time before tiring of it eventually and then return home. He does just that but a lot has changed. Perhaps aiming for the heights of screwball comedy gold "Airplane"; "Full Moon High" is just a plain old misfire. Maybe some quality inside jokes flew by me but the flick is spoofing Werewolf oldie's left and right while trying to be somewhat topical of changing times and values in the old US of A. There are scattered laughs here and there in 93 minutes (mostly with Ed McMahon and Kenneth Mars - the shower scene early on is pretty funny) but on the whole this is a pretty painful sit-through. Certainly a one of a kind movie and not surprisingly it has a small cult following; I'm all for that (mostly in the horror department myself though) but I can't honestly recommend this movie for comedy buffs. Adam Arkin is likable here but like most others he looks a little lost and no wonder. I'll give the movie one thing; it's anything but predictable as I never knew what direction it was going to turn to next. Halfway through I thought I had it pegged but was I dead wrong! Weird flick and not in the good way.

Love Larry Cohen's work and his teen horror spoof "Full Moon High" is no exception to the trend. It might not be mentioned alongside other such films like "It's Alive", "Q-The Winged Serpent" and "God told Me to", but for me Cohen has hardly put a foot wrong. Yep I enjoyed such films like "Perfect Strangers", "A Return to Salem's lot" and "Special Effects". 9 out of 10 times I'm satisfied with what he helms.Set in the 1950s Tony Walker an American high school jock who heads to Transylvania with his father on a holiday getaway, but is cursed with immortality when he's bitten by a werewolf. Returning home to the States he finds it hard to control the beast inside and that he's stuck to roam the world like this for eternity.The Cohen produced / directed / written enterprise "Full Moon High" is an amusingly goof-ball, if low-brow (numerous gay and sex jokes) comedy poking fun at the werewolf genre with constant in-jokes and homage's. It's a fun, snappy ride with its rapid fire tongue-in-cheek gags, sharply cheeky dialogues ("It's a Wookiee!") and animated performances from a game cast. Plenty of lively and humorous appearances, as there's fun to be had with the likes of Ed Machon, Kenneth Mars, Alan Arkin, Roz Kelly, Elizabeth Hartman, Demond Wilson and a Cohen regular James Dixon. Adam Arkin in the lead is quite straight and dry with the delivery, but it seems to fit. His chemistry with Machon (portraying his father) was always delightful with the witty exchanges, especially when he encounters his son in werewolf form. "The Commies turned my son into a wolf!". The story's structure is randomly pieced together, but held by its laconically sarcastic script and Larry Cohen's ably assured and zippy direction. It's a flat out comedy with less concern with the running themes of some sort of social commentary (although the first half does touch upon the cold war paranoia), which is usually found within Cohen's writing. Even with the low-budget restraints (just look at the cheap transformation scene and werewolf make-up), he neatly works around it to make you more captivated with the characters and their actions. Through keeping everything in the shadows or done in POV shots (with resourceful photographer Daniel Pearl) and suggestively off-screen. Still I thought the make-up was decent enough, if you take for face value as it has that old-fashion touch of those golden oldies."Full Moon High" isn't high art, but it doesn't pretend to be anything else than what it sets out to be. Agreeable comedy entertainment.

In this send-up of horror films, 50's cold war paranoia, Reagan-era America, and high school films, Adam Arkin plays Tony, the star quarterback of Full Moon High in the 1950's. He and his father (Ed McMahon) travel to communist Romania and while he's lost in the streets one night, he is bitten by a werewolf. When he returns stateside, he cannot control his animalistic urges and goes on a killing spree. Frustrated, he flees town. Decades later, the immortal Tony returns to town and re-enrolls in highschool. He still can't control his transformations, and the townspeople, and his friends, realize he's not quite human. It all culminates during the schools big football game.I expected this to be one of those 'so bad it's good' films from the early 80's. But I was surprised that the film was actually, legitimately funny. The cast, including Kenneth Mars as a pervy coach, Roz Kelly as Tony's lusty former flame, Demond Wilson as a bus driver, and Alan Arkin as a oddball doctor, go all out, with hilarious results.While watching this film I was struck by how similar the writing and humor were to 'Family Guy.' 'Full Moon High' has that same anything goes attitude and never takes itself seriously.

I'm not kidding about that summary and vote! The video distributors have packaged this as just another typical '80s werewolf movie, but it is in fact the greatest parody of the horror genre that you can imagine, having done for the horror movie what "Blazing Saddles" did for the western. I have seen plenty of comedies - good, bad, stupid, weird, etc. (usually walking away unimpressed), and I think that comedy must be the most difficult genre for filmmakers and actors to work in - it takes just the right kind of touch to make things successful, and part of that is having good ideas. "Full Moon High" is bulging with good ideas - so many, in fact, that it can easily put the Zucker/Abrams team of "Airplane" and "Naked Gun" to shame. One of the best of these is the very presence of Ed McMahon in a starring role as a John Birch-style right-wing crackpot. The jokes, non-sequiturs, wisecracks and word-play are literally non-stop and everything, including the kitchen sink, has been thrown in. The ironic tone is very similar to that of "Back to the Future." Some people (i.e. almost every reviewer here) must have been turned off by the spirit of anarchy here, but I almost died of laughter, and this is one of those movies in which you never know what kind of insane situation will transpire next. Since B-movie extraordinaire Larry Cohen had not made a straight comedy before this, one gets the sense that he was making up for lost time by including any joke he or his collaborators could think of. If Mel Brooks had made this, the critics would have labelled it a comic masterpiece, but because it was made by Cohen, it has been dismissed as schlock. Critical reviews have called this movie too "silly." SILLY? What is a comedy supposed to be - serious?! Anyway, I laughed out loud more for this movie than any other I can think of. Cohen makes fun of everyone - himself included, with plenty of references to his usual brand of low-rent film-making; he and the actors must have had a complete blast making this.The humor is very Mel Brooks-ish, and anyone who loves Jewish humor or watches a lot of B-movies (especially horror) will love this. Trust me: the movie isn't too hard to find, and as long as you accept it for what it is - a roller-coaster of belly laughs with no pretense of social value whatsoever - then you'll truly enjoy it!!One sidenote: this movie should somehow go down in history as the one thing Bob Saget ever starred in (albeit briefly) that was actually funny.