Director: Enzo G. Castellari
Year: 1981
Country: Italy
Alternate Titles: L’Ultimo squalo, Great White
Genre: Sharks
Plot:
In the coastal town of Port Harbor, a writer grows concerned about the town’s safety after a series of strange disappearances on the water, and when he and family start to rack up debris from the disappearances they come to believe a huge great white shark is responsible and launch a massive campaign to stop it once and for all.
Review:
This was actually a lot of fun and wasn't all that bad. One of the biggest enjoyment factors is that the film has a lot of shark action, resulting in a really quick pace to it. The best attack is one of the initial attack, where the victim has a couple of surprises before ultimately getting chomped, as his surfboard gets suddenly chomped with no one being seen and then explodes out of the water as if hit from below. The scene of it breaking into the quarantine zone while the beachgoers are oblivious swimming in the water, while the centerpiece regala attack is the best as the sheer chaos that erupts is fantastic to watch. It's long, intense and full of action as people fall off their boards with regular fashion, and there's a later scene where it rips away a part of a dock and drags it away with people still on it then proceeds to attack them one-by-one which lands several impressive suspense scenes out of them.
Additionally, a lot of entertainment value and amusement stems from the apparent intelligence of the shark, as its acts of carnage are born not just out of animal instinct but seemingly out of some semblance of cunning malefic intent. The fact that this flies in the face of all known scientific fact, even by the standards of the time, only tends to make this all the more amusing. Either way, it is hard not to smile as the shark intentionally traps a protagonist in an underwater cave by pushing boulders in front of the entrance and later leaps into the air to seize a hovering helicopter and drag the craft into the depths. Aside from its actions, the mere sight is pleasing, as seeing this stiff-looking model shooting out of the water tilted at the same angle manages to bring some really intense satisfaction from it tends to accentuate the films already not inconsiderable trashy appeal. Every time it came out, there's a real cheese-factor charm to it. All in all, it's a really fun film.
As good as it is, there are still a couple of flaws. The biggest is that much of the shark attacks are made up of stock footage that any sense of maintaining the illusion isn't even successful. The shark looks to be changing sizes constantly with so much stock footage. Despite it actually trying with the very clever insertion of genuine Great White Shark stock footage, several shots tend to use footage that isn't even from Great Whites, destroying the illusion even more than the fact that it's actually using that type of trick in the first place. On top of that, it’s also hard to get over how the shark looks pretty bad. It consists of a rather cheap-looking rubber shark's head and is mixed in with plenty of stock footage to try and create the illusion that it''s a real shark. Despite adding a cheesy factor here it looks quite bad for a real on-set prop and makes for a silly time here, but otherwise, this was quite fine.
Overview: ***.5/5
With only a few small problems that don't really mean all that much, this becomes a really entertaining and enjoyable film with those really looking for these kinds of positive elements. It's recommended viewing for those who enjoy these cheesy films or fans of European horror, while others who prefer more well-rounded material might give it a shot.
Comments
Post a Comment