Mega Shark Vs Giant Octopus

Director: Jack Perez (Though the film calls him 'Ace Hannah'. I don't know what happened there, but a sign of things to come).

Look at that poster right there. That my friends, is a poster that says "Look at me, do you KNOW how good a time you're going to have with me? I'm going to be the best time you've ever had". And like all advertising, it's a lie.

Now when it comes to films I like my crap. I unashamedly own 'Street Fighter: The Movie', and not just the regular old DVD no, I bought the Special Edition. I've seen and enjoyed 'Frankenfish', 'Snakes on a Train' and the now legendary 'Shark Attack 3: Megalodon' amongst other things. But you know that when I can't even enjoy a film like this you're not in for a good time.

The main issue with MSvGO as I'll call it from now on is that people just love to sit around and talk, occasionally they're mix some stuff in a beaker, wait for it to turn a certain colour and then look disheartened. Seeing as we don't know what they're supposed to be doing we can only take this visual cue as a bad sign. Eventually they do find the right colour, and it's high fives all around.

Now, we'll start at the beginning, because I know you're dying to find out how these creatures came to be. You're thinking 'Army Experiment' I'm sure. Well you're wrong. Basically our Heroine, Emma, played by Debbie Gibson (Yes THAT Debbie Gibson) is doing some kind of research around the Ice Caps. She's in one of those little submarines that only get to fit about 3 people at most in them. Emma and her assistant are observing Whales in the region, but there's trouble to be had in these here waters. A shady Helicopter pilot is in the area and he drops some kind of Sonar emitter into the Water. This is causing the Whales to go a little haywire and they start ramming themselves into the Ice Caps. The Ice slides away to reveal our titular heroes, frozen in mid fight. So far, so 'Demolition Man'.

Anyway they just...swim off, though not before Emma has spotted them. Also the Helicopter pilot inexplicably crashes and blows up for reasons that aren't really clear. He just...does. Then our tentacled friend suddenly attacks an oil rig in Japan, and we start to foolishly believe that we're in for a good time.

We're not.

From that point on, which in reality is about 10 minutes into the film, we get oooooh about 2 other scenes of Aquatic carnage. But luckily for us they're both pretty good (Though I concede that's a relative term).

Cut to a 747 flying through a storm, a man is restless, the Plane is struck by Turbulence. They have to go lower, the man remains restless. Then this exchange.

Stewardess: Please sit down sir, it's just an air pocket.
Passenger: We'regettingmarriedintwodays.
Stewardess: It'll be fine.

Now I like to think that actor flexed his chops by throwing that line in there without consulting anyone first. Undoubtedly this production needs characters like him, but his ad libbing, which makes no sense in context, is met with a fair response from the actress playing the stewardess who gamely remains in character and refuses to play along with the young method actors game. Quite wise (Consults IMDB) Dana Tomasko, quite wise.

Anyway the man manages to calm himself, before he looks out of the Window and sees the Mega Shark leaping out of the Sea, mouth agape. For the record we don't actually see it eating the plane, that would cost too much, and there's no way they can recycle that footage.

From there we have a lot of talking. A LOT of talking. A Japanese Scientist comes over the Seas to help Emma and her friendly Irish former Professor, who has an inkling to calling Emma "Lassie". There's also an ill advised romance between Emma and our new Japanese friend. After meeting each other for about 5 minutes they literally stare at each other for a further 5 minutes before having the most awkward kiss since Vin Diesel and Asia Argento in 'xXx'.

I could detail the rest of the film. But instead I'll sum it up in one word: Talking. People just talk, talk and...talk. At one point Lorenzo "Renegade" Lamas shows up as some sort of hip Government official who doesn't necessarily talk as much as just bark at people. His act gets old about 5 minutes after he appears.

After pouring more liquid into some beakers and awaiting the right results, sadly to no avail, our intrepid heroes come up with the decision to just let them fight to the Death. Actually Emma gets the idea during a nightmare, and bursts into a room all excited and shouts "Thrilla in Manila" (Based on the famous Boxing bout of the same name). The plan makes no sense. It's entirely plausible that if they get them both to fight that one would kill the other. Nothing wrong with that, but their grand plan hinges on the fact that they both manage to kill each other. I'm not even sure how that would happen. But that's our plan dammit, and we're sticking to it.

And, SPOILER ALERT! That's exactly what happens actually. It's the most unsatisfying climax I've ever seen since Peter North's 'North Pole 27', the renowned Peter North film where he failed to live up to his usual potential.

What we actually get is the same 3 special effects shot repeated over and over again, accept some are mirrored or slyly zoomed in. No expense made here, I'm sure you'll agree. So they both die somehow, and sink to the bottom of the Ocean. Everyone is happy, everyone kisses. The world is safe.

We even get a continuation of the daring, and of course totally convincing Interracial romance. There's also a hint to a sequel that I hope we never ever see. I'd rather see a 'Twilight' sequel than the continuing adventures of Debbie Gibson.

Drag Me To Hell

Well today I thought I'd stop everything and review this little movie. Mega shark can wait.


Well today I thought I'd stop everything and review this little movie. Mega shark can wait.

Director: Sam Raimi

There's a few film makers that I look forward to hearing from. They've earned my trust enough in the past that I'll make a note of catching whatever they put out. Sam Raimi is one of them. It's true, he did a fair amount of damage when he made 'Spider-Man 3', an utterly soulless film that came directly out of Sony's marketing department. But then I watched 'Evil Dead 2' again and I was ready to forgive him.

It's good to see a Director return to their roots, and that's exactly what Raimi did here. In some ways the film just feels like an experiment, a quick knock off to show that he can still do it. But if knock offs come as good as this then I don't mind at all.

The story, flimsy at best, is that loans clerk Christine Brown is REALLY desperate for the Assistant Manager position. The problem is that she's far too nice. Her slightly devious boss tells her that if she toughens up the job is all hers. Sadly the moment she decides to toughen up is the moment a Gypsy Woman asks for the third extension on her loan. Christine makes the hard choice and turns her down, knowing it will curry favour with her boss. The Gypsy responds by cursing her. Hey, it happens.

Thanks to a nifty prologue we know that Christine will be tormented for 3 days and then taken to Hell. And that's where the fun begins.

Raimi has always straddled the line between Horror/Comedy, and the balance is just right here. There are two schools of thought when it comes to the genre, one is that the horror and the comedy comes at different times. The ultimate example would be 'An American Werewolf In London'. The scary moments are scary, and the funny moments are funny. In Raimi's film the laugh comes from the scares. Every encounter is punctuated with a laugh, such as the early scene where Christine and the Gypsy fight in her Car. It starts off menacing enough, before featuring a moment where the Gypsy tries to bite Christine before realising that she doesn't have her false teeth in, thus gumming her repeatedly.

Though the script is a little too on the nose at times, the performances are still good to watch. Alison Lohman is very good in the lead, taking the place of Bruce Campbell as Raimi's victim. No one enjoys torturing his Actors as much as Raimi, but Lohman rises to the challenge, so much so that there were one or two moments where I was convinced she was channeling Ash from the Evil Dead films. Justin Long, an actor who's always sadly under-used has the unfortunate role of 'concerned boyfriend' but he makes it work. It's more a testament to Long than it is to the script.

Raimi directs things with his usual Kinetic style and cranks the soundtrack to 11. It's possibly the loudest film ever made, so do make sure you take some painkillers with you just in case. I'm sure more than a few headaches were started by that film. Also, if possible, view with a crowd. Usually I hate the sound of other people in the Cinema, but when a guy behind me called up his friend and said that "Shit is all messed up" I didn't mind so much (In truth I did, but luckily the film is so loud I didn't really hear him anyway). Plus there's nothing funnier than hearing a girlish scream and then seeing a guy's girlfriend laughing at him for it.

All in all it's refreshing to see a film that just wants to entertain. There's a tendency with horror now to be all about the 'suffering'. And indeed, that's true of this film, but the difference is that there's a playfulness to it. It's purely in the name of entertainment. The same way a Roller Coaster is designed purely just to jolt you and make you laugh. You won't sit there thinking about it for days afterwards, but who cares? The ride was so much fun.