Director: John Pogue
Year: 2020
Country: USA
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Sharks
Plot:
Working on a remote research facility, a scientist and her team researching the effects of climate change on local sharks are approached by an old friend to help him track sharks that have gotten loose, but when they learn the true nature of his visit are forced to battle several dangerous threats to get away alive.
Review:
There was a lot to like with this effort. One of the strongest features here is the fine setup that provides a fun thoughline for what happens here. The early series of exploratory measures around the facility showing their research into sharks and the community they have together is nicely off-set by the sudden arrival of the hunters looking around for the missing creatures serves to introduce the two groups rather well. Realizing the differences in their approach where they’re approaching in a grass-roots conservation angle whereas the hunters are flashy, big-money corporation-sponsored scientists creates an intriguing storyline where everything is worked out early on to not only know who they are but weaves the rest of the franchise together.
As well, there’s a lot to like here with the realization about the threat posed by the sharks. The initial underwater sequence where the discovery of the dead sharks and the spectacular reveal about the deceased crewmember gives us quite a nice sequence, while the hunting sequence later on where they manage to capture the one shark to begin studying it offers several fun action scenes showing off the danger posed to them by the sharks. Several other fun scenes, from the sharks attacking the ship to retrieve the captured shark, the spectacular shot of the shark jumping out of the water to grab a victim jumping from a ship into the water or leaping out of the water to grab another victim brawling on the shore makes for a series of fun attack scenes.
The last positive here is the rather fun and frantic final half that turns the film into a solid action-packed outing. With the decision to go for the switch involving who the real villains are, there’s quite a lot of action throughout here which isn’t usually present here as the gun battle that destroys a major part of the facility, several hard-hitting fist-fights and various other encounters throughout the facility all while trying to avoid the killer sharks circling around keep this one fun and quite thrilling. The battle to finally stop the sharks is enjoyable as well, getting several small confrontations to get each shark under control, resulting in some decent gore and a clever enough method to finally defeat the final shark which goes alongside the passable practical effects to hold this one up.
There aren’t a whole lot of issues to be had here. The biggest flaw is the wholly unrealistic storyline about the secrecy of the project which gets incredibly frustrating how shortsighted this is. The idea of ignoring orders and doing everything for the betterment of the company, which includes killing eyewitnesses and making out for the money would’ve been fine without several speeches about the shifted allegiance and the right thing to do that none of it makes any sense for the motivations to do so. On top of that, this series of allegiance shifts takes away a minor threat posed by the sharks in order to deal with that instead which is quite unimpressive to downgrade the sharks. Alongside the somewhat obvious CGI which isn’t too bad but stands out in use, there isn’t much wrong with this one.
Overview: ****/5
A highly enjoyable and cheesy creature feature, there’s not much to dislike here unless you’re an ardent dissident of this style since this hits all the proper notes needed for this type of film. Give it a shot if you’re that kind of fan of cheesy creature features, a follower of killer shark films or enjoy the franchise while those that aren’t into this kind of film or were turned off by the previous film in the franchise should heed caution.
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