Director: Joe Alves
Year: 1983
Country: USA
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Sharks
Plot:
As Sea World is about to open a new attraction, the resident workers find the area home to a shark only to have it die rather quickly yet when they find the shark's mother still living inside and attacking the facilities they race to stop it before it destroys the park.
Review:
This one wasn't that bad and was actually pretty decent. One of the film's greatest factors is that the characterization scenes aren't all that aggravating to sit through. The bar scenes and the few scenes with the couples on the job are decently done, giving off a nice sense that a normal couple could be involved in these types of affairs without being forced into them. The action does come along at the end in all the right installments, featuring a lot of big action set-pieces that come off really well at first with the brief first attacks as well as the great encounter in the lagoon when they first encounter with the smaller shark.
The discovery of the mother starts the film in earnest as the sight of the shark appearing in front of a panicked crowd of tourists and crashing into their structure has delightful possibilities, and they are somewhat played nicely here. The race to fix the stranded visitors is a nice suspense-builder, coming off in a very elegant manner and allowing for some really nail-biting scenes following the shark attacking the complex itself providing some nice action. The chase through the underwater ship is pretty nicely done and comes off with a great air of urgency about it. The shark in here also looks the closest to a real shark, giving off a realistic shape that is really close to a great white rather than a demonic face with a shark's body. It also displays a realistic touch by moving its upper lip to attack, something that none of the other sharks did.
This wasn't all that terrible as there actually isn't that much to really dislike in this one. Most of what's wrong with the film is that the effects are pretty abysmal in general. The 3D effect isn't employed beyond poking objects into the camera for no reason, while the green-screen photography present also doesn't help matters, oftentimes making them look worse. There's no believability at all in hardly anything in the film, especially the young, lifeless shark and this really hurts the film. It's nearly impossible to have any fear or tension in a film where the main threat isn't imposing, and it's on display nearly every time there's a shark on-screen here.
The stupidity inherent in so many situations is a major crime, especially the shark's capture and display to the public being quite obvious and wouldn't play out in real life. The measure of taking out the creature also applies, as it really defies logic and in a scene full of nonsensical things, it's hard to pick one thing about the ending that really works. The shark itself deserves mention, as the body count in here is really unacceptable. For a giant shark to cause as much damage and mischief as it does, to be around as many thrashing bodies in the water as it always manages to be around, and the fact that it sneaks up on the victims isn't going to be left out. There should've been more kills in here, and with so many missed opportunities, it's a real shame. These are the main things involved with this that really bring it down.
Overview: **.5/5
While it would've been fine with an imposing monster since that's where a lot of the issues come from, this is still far from the heights of the original entries but comes off better than what's to come. Give it a shot if you're a franchise completist or looking for this kind of cheesy genre effort but most others out there won't enjoy this one and should heed caution before going further with it.
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