Shark Swarm (2008)

Very well executed

Admirable film.

A film with more than the usual spoiler issues. Talking about it in any detail feels akin to handing you a gift-wrapped present and saying, "I hope you like it -- It's a thriller about a diabolical secret experiment."

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Yet another in the long line of Creature Feature TV movies that seem to be the bane of modern cinema in the 2000s. SHARK SWARM has everything I dislike about such productions: a low budget (in a bad way), poor cast, rubbish script, and, worst of all, rubbishy CGI effects. The effects in this one are among the worst I've seen: the sharks are relegated to murky, underwater CGI images throughout the film, with nary a mechanical beastie in sight. The budget is low too, of course, and the script takes the scraps left over by JAWS and turns them into a lacklustre thriller with obvious nods to the likes of PIRANHA and others, all of them better films than this. So once again we have a greedy corporate type busy building a business and ignoring the warning signs; a courageous, humble fisherman who first spots the menace; bodies washed up on the beach; fishermen catching something more than they bargained for; marine biologists and women in rubber suits, and lots of other B-movie elements. Even one of the characters is called Bill Girdler, in reference to a director of popular 'animal attack' movies back in the '70s.The one thing this film does have going for it is the cast: although the performances are bad, more of the faces are familiar than you might expect. I'm not talking about the B-movie regulars who pop up in this, although there are a lot of them (John Enos III, John Schneider, Heather McComb, Willie C. Carpenter). I'm talking about the 'once weres', former greats at the box office now relegated to making this trash and picking up a pay cheque afterwards. Daryl Hannah, old collagen lips, whose career seems to be in free fall with this and KUNG FU KILLER; and F. Murray Abraham, who knows no shame with this and BLOOD MONKEY (although his appearance here is little more than a cameo), and worst of all, the leathery, bewigged Armand Assante, who once played to audiences in JUDGE DREDD and 1492. Meanwhile, director James A. Contner once worked as a cinematographer on JAWS 3D, so I guess he knew what he was doing when he set out to shoot this. A worthless movie indeed.

"Hamilton Lux" (Armand Assante) is a real estate developer who wants to buy all of the homes and business of the small fishing town of Full Moon Bay in order to build condos overlooking the Pacific Ocean. So in order to compel the townsfolk to sell their property to him he has secretly poisoned the nearby coastal waters to kill all of the fish and impoverish the community to such an extent that they will be more than happy to take whatever he offers them. Unfortunately for him, one particular fisherman by the name of "Daniel Wilder" (John Schneider) has no intention of selling out and he happens to own a vital piece of property that Hamilton Lux needs desperately. Even worse is the fact that the particular chemicals used by Hamilton Lux to poison the fish has not only drastically affected the ecological balance but it has also resulted in the sharks hunting in large schools in search of the only food sources now available to them—vacationers enjoying the waters off Full Moon Bay. Now rather than reveal any more of this movie I will just say that, for a made-for-television film, it wasn't too bad. Although I didn't care for some of the characters, I particularly liked the performance of Amy Zuckerman (as "Heather McComb") and the aforementioned Armand Assante. I also thought the shark footage was okay for the most part as well. In any case, although a bit long I have rated the movie as about average and recommend it to those who enjoy films of this type.

The previous reviews pretty much summed up my feelings about this really bad movie, so I'll just add a few more tidbits that might further encourage you not to watch it. Lots of people killed by sharks and nobody misses them. Shark attacks and dead sharks on the beach and no shark warnings to keep people out of the water. Everyone who falls into the ocean gets eaten by sharks except the stars of the movie. This movie was so bad I stopped watching it 30 minutes before the ending. I'm guessing the ending was "sharks destroyed, boy gets girl, everyone lives happily ever after". 4 hours was about 240 minutes too long. What a waste of my time.

This movie was a classic "B" - - SciFi type of movie. It has a wonderful cast of really good actors...but in my opinion the plot was anemic, the directing was even more-so...and I loved it! Why? Because the cast each did an excellent job of acting and the setting was believable. One can see from the 'heft' of big stars where the budget most certainly was spent. It most certainly wasn't spent on special effects or, for that matter, screen writing.All in all, I would not only recommend it because of its positive aspects...but would watch it again and again if the opportunity affords itself. The positives outweigh the negatives.