Sharktopus – Review

Until the recent release of Alex Aja’s awesome remake, Piranha 3D, I had not seen a fun, good old-fashioned underwater creature feature since Deep Rising and Deep Blue Sea. While all three of these pictures had the benefit of large budgets and a studio backing, they wore their monster mash carrying cards proudly as they churned out body counts and gore galore.

This can be done in the low budget doldrums as well, as seen in the Roger Corman produced classics Humanoids from the Deep and the original Piranha. They were both lean, mean, eviscerating machines where the latex monsters chowed down on any naked, stupid, and clueless piece of meat that crossed their path. The make-up effects on both might seem primitive compared to what we see now, but they felt like they were part of the film because they were on-set and not created on a laptop.

This brings me to the cinematic fart blower that is Sharktopus from producer Roger Corman and those genuises at the Sci-Fi, I mean, Syfy Channel.

The Blue Water laboratory is working on S-11, a genetically engineered, half-shark, half-octupus for the Navy so they can use it as a super weapon. After taking a hit to its cartoony looking skull, the Z-grade actors are no longer in control of S-11 as it makes its way south of the border to Mexico to chomp on some burritos and scandily-clad bimbos. Eric Roberts, hamming it up like there is no tomorrow, re-hires an old hunky employee who is the only one who can take down the eight-legged, man-eating hybrid. Where is Quint from Jaws when you need him? I’m tired of these crappy Syfy Channel movies. I’m tired of how deplorable they are. I had ten drinks before I began to watch Sharktopus and it still hurt my head.

Raise your hand if you ever played Sega CD. The graphics were better on that video game system than any of the special effects in this clunker. I am sure this movie was probably made for peanuts, but the CG was about as a real as any part of Kim Kardashian’s face. Since this was made directly for television, the closest you get to a gipple or a mulva is the beach blanket sunbathers who managed to give me a serious case of blue balls.

I was able to give Sharktowuss half a star for the clever cameo by Roger Corman, who shows up and gets a good look at the derrière of a blonde as she bends over to look for a coin on the beach. That kind of free spirit mentality is sorely missed here, but hope springs eternal as B-movie maven Fred Olen Ray [Beverly Hills Vamp] tackles the nature run amok thriller next year with Super Shark.

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