There’s a disturbingly prevalent trend in movies nowadays where
especially horror movies seem to like trying
to be bad. Mostly this comes from the pop-culture phenomenon of people loving
to “riff” on silly things in movies. Which I am a complete stranger to of course…but it seems that young filmmakers
and studios trying to ride the wave have caught onto this and decided to just
go all out and make films that were over the top bad on purpose, with corny
actors and plots more suited to SNL joke sketches. Of course, this wasn’t a new
phenomenon, as movies like Bubba Ho-Tep, Killer Klowns and others proved back
in the 80s and 90s. But where those movies were actually funny…a lot of these
new movies are just gimmicky nonsense with as little effort put into them as possible, which the creators mistakenly mistook for comedy.
Enter Sharknado…
Director: Anthony C. Ferrante (because a middle initial makes you look artsy)
Starring: Tornadoes, sharks, Tara Reid
Yes, this is perhaps symptomatic of a lot of these kinds of films. I’ll
give you an example. What is the plot? “Sharks come out of tornados and fly and
kill people on land.” I won’t lie and say that doesn’t sound like it has the
potential to create some very funny scenes, and it does have its moments. But
just a funny premise isn’t all it takes to make one of these kinds of films. Frankly
I can’t even say the movie’s name without feeling bad about it.
We start off with some bullshit on a ship with two guys re-enacting
scenes from the Christopher Nolan Batman movies, sitting at a table in a dimly lit room and talking about supposedly serious mob shit. Okay, maybe not, but they’re
so overly melodramatic and have nothing to do with the actual plot. Mother
nature apparently agrees with me, and appropriately sends a shark to kill them all:
Then we switch to something very logical with an alternative rock song
and a sunny beach day where everyone is having fun. We see John Heard from the
Home Alone movies drunk in a bar, bothering some girl with a scar on her leg.
It kind of looks like gills, so obviously she’s actually a fish woman from
Mars.
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| If only... |
The main guy’s name is Fin, and he goes surfing with some girl who
calls him grandpa…I’d say this is stupid, since he looks about 35, but given
today’s MTV generation being into ‘teen moms’ so much, I think it’s realistic.
Plus, we see that calling Fin grandpa is apparently all it takes for the sharks
to attack that girl. We get the same scene you’ve seen in every shark movie
ever made. I do love it when movies have nothing original to offer…oh, wait,
but it’s supposed to be bad. That makes it OK.
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| The only thing they don't do is just flat out play the Jaws theme over these scenes. |
Fin goes to save his friend, who gets bit by one of the sharks, and
successfully brings him back on land…which prompts the girl from the bar to
come out and scold Fin for almost getting killed. Yeah, Fin, how dare you save people and bring them away
from vicious man eating sharks! You inconsiderate ass!
In the bar, they hole up and hide as a storm comes and floods the
beach. A newscaster who sounds like she’s talking to retarded kids comes on TV
and talks about how bad the storm is. Fin acknowledges this and says they
should all leave the bar and go home, because telling people to go outside when
a huge hurricane is about to come through is an awesome idea, right? He then
calls his ex-wife and asks if she and his daughter are okay, to which she
rudely cuts him off thinking he’s asking about money. Even though he says he wants to know if they’re okay,
she thinks he’s calling in the middle of a bad storm to ask about money. What a
great catch she must’ve been…
Also, as soon as he gets off the phone, the scar-girl who works at the
bar jumps on him for no reason, and he says he’s her boss – oh, is THAT what he
is? What subtle exposition! I guess too much time was spent on girls calling
him grandpa to find out that he owned the bar…got to play to your strengths,
you know?
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| "Hi, I'm John Heard. I only took this role because they said I could have all the beer I wanted and hang out at the bar most of the movie." |
Anyway, enough time has been wasted already. We see Fin, the scar-girl,
whose name is Nova, Fin’s friend and John Heard – they probably just found him
drinking at the bar and put him in the movie without him noticing – pile into a
car and try to escape. I’m not sure driving around is the best way to combat a
frigging hurricane, you idiots. Try finding shelter first.
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| There are a few scenes like this, where people tell them that "it's just a bit of rain"...come on, it's clearly not. Are you that delusional? Hurricanes don't just switch on and off whenever you want, you know. They're dangerous. If you're standing outside in the middle of one, it's probably not a good idea! |
They drive around for a bit and see sharks kill a bunch of people.
These are probably some of the better scenes in the movie; I mean really what
else did anyone go into this looking for? So I won’t really bitch about it too
much. John Heard gets killed off, probably because the director spent most of
his money on hookers in his trailer during most of it and didn’t have enough to
keep paying him. Nova acts like she’s sad, but really nobody cares or mentions
him again throughout the film. Are you really surprised?
So really the movie is just sharks eating people for a while – dammit,
Sharknado, with a title like that I
was expecting nothing less than pure cinematic drama genius! How DARE you fail
to deliver?! They make it to Fin’s family’s house and find his wife Tara Reid
telling them to leave. Yeah, in the middle of a hurricane. Is this lady
serious? He goes inside and sees his daughter, and oh come on:
Did he have kids at age 15 or something? He doesn’t look older than 30
or 35, and she has to be about 16!
Anyway, she bitches at him too, then we see the most metrosexual
character this movie could conjure up, who is supposed to be Tara Reid’s new
boyfriend or whatever. Apparently he was just hanging out in the daughter’s
room. Uh, might want to check into that, guys. Usually it’s not a good thing
when a grown man hangs out in his stepdaughter’s room…
But I digress. The boyfriend or stepdad or whoever he is, bitches about
how Fin can’t just come and see his family when there’s a big storm outside
because – gasp! – it’s not the time of month he’s allowed to see his daughter!
God forbid he cares about his family in a crisis! Man this is the pits; who
would ever find this enjoyable? What human being would EVER act this way?
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| "I'm the world's biggest douchebag. How do you do?" |
Oh, wait, I forgot again: it’s supposed
to be bad! So that nullifies any and all criticisms against the film. Silly
me. It's also mind numbingly retarded when Tara Reid tells the boyfriend to leave Fin alone, because a second ago she was bitching at him and telling him to leave, so it makes perfect sense that she'd have a change of heart that fast! Ugh...how much longer is this? 50 minutes? Christ, if you cut out all of these god-awful "dramatic" scenes, the film would have been about 20 minutes. Next time try that.
I love this one part, where Nova says there are sharks all around the
city and then looks out the window to see one right there.
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| How is that even flooded? Didn't they just drive up two minutes ago and it was completely fine? |
That’s some funny shit. Even better is when the metrosexual
boyfriend/husband asshole says she’s crazy and opens the window just in time
for the shark to jump through it and kill him.
Ha ha ha…okay, I forgive the movie now. That death was completely
justified! Sure it was pretty stupid how the house randomly flooded as soon as he opened the curtains, but eh, I'll give it a pass this time.
Unfortunately the movie decides it’s not time for more silly shark
deaths, but instead for more bullshit exposition. We find out Fin also has a
son around the same age as his daughter…Jesus, did he first get Tara Reid
pregnant when he was in junior high school? Apparently they shipped the son off
to space camp or something without telling Fin, which he gets mad about.
Honestly, who cares? This movie is so reliant on having “camp” with the shark
attacks and everything, but come on; so much of this crap is just people
bitching at one another and arguing about trivial shit. Like many poorly made
films it relies on arguing as the only mode of creating dialogue, which isn’t
funny or interesting, it’s just crap to the nth degree. If I really wanted
arguing and whining, I’d just read the comment section on any political-themed
article on CNN. And all this in the middle of an intense hurricane no less!
Some focus on the important stuff might
be necessary, guys!
So now the mission is to go find Fin’s son. Tara Reid bitches about how
Fin cares more about helping random strangers than his own family. Uh, I’m
sorry, WHO is taking you in his car to safety right now, bitch? Jesus. Fin has
a godlike level of tolerance for this…if it were me, I’d just be like “I’m
feeding you to the sharks, you whore!” And then I’d push her out of the car.
Seriously, what kind of person would act
this way? It’s one thing to have conflict, but at least make it justified…if
you want your characters to fight and argue, show us why both sides have their
points. You can’t just have Tara Reid and her equally annoying daughter keep
saying that Fin is an ass, because we don’t see
any proof of it! So it mostly just makes me want to drill into my brain with an
electric chainsaw.
Next they save a school bus full of children from sharks by climbing up
a bungee cord onto a high bridge which isn’t flooded yet. Then the Hollywood
sign starts trying to kill them, which I think is some kind of subtle metaphor
for the movie as a whole.
Hell, the one guy is like “My mother always said Hollywood would kill
me,” and then the ‘H’ drops on him and flattens him instantly. Probably as
punishment for making such a terrible joke.
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| He could still be OK. You never know. |
In the spirit of not wasting time, they stop by a liquor store next and
talk to the cashier about the cause of the hurricanes. He says it’s stupid to
think it’s the apocalypse. But then he goes and says it’s actually the government
in charge of it all! Yes, he actually thinks it’s a weather machine the government is using to kill everyone. There’s a
reason he’s a liquor store clerk and not anything else. Frankly I’m almost positive this liquor store only gave them permission
to film there because the writers were such regular customers at the store.
That’s the only thing that makes sense.
Then we see the only reason to watch this movie at all:
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| A naturally occurring weather phenomenon... |
Yep, tornadoes with sharks inside them…I gotta hand it to the movie,
anyone that can somehow make a plot that gets a bunch of sharks inside tornadoes is at least trying. Even if it's effort put into the wrong things.
They finally find the son, who is totally accepting about the whole
thing and has no questions whatsoever. He’s so complacent and calm that it’s
almost like he was just guessing this
would happen soon. Also he is by far the worst actor in the movie, which is
saying a lot when you have the two main guys. Half of the people in this thing
look like they’re hungover anyway, but this kid is easily the worst of them. I
have half a mind to say he was just directed like this on purpose…remember, it’s
supposed to be bad!
Their plan is to go drop a bomb in the middle of the tornado. Yes,
really. While they’re getting ready to do that,
we find out Nova’s backstory: apparently when she was a kid, she got lost at
sea and bitten by a shark, which is why she has that scar on her leg…so glad a
shark was able to leave a scar this small:
Then apparently her grandfather tried to save her and got eaten by a
shark. So now she hates sharks. And lives in California on the coast. I can
practically hear the marbles rolling around inside the writers’ hollow heads. I also love this scene where the daughter tells Fin that she feels neglected by him and like he doesn't do enough for her - gee, maybe it's because you're an ungrateful brat who tells him to go away whenever he shows up uninvited. Maybe that has something to do with why he doesn't love you as much.
Ugh, this is too stupid; can we just see more scenes of sharks attacking helicopters now? The plan to bomb the tornado goes off without a hitch:
Oh, did I say without a hitch? I meant to say that it does nothing and
the sharks keep coming anyway. I guess they ate the explosion. Nova apparently
dies after getting eaten, and then on the ground we see that sharks can bounce
when they hit the ground at the right angle!
Make that shit into a McDonalds toy. The bouncing shark! Also, this is probably the greatest shot in the movie, simply because you will never see it ever again:
Fin goes and grabs a chainsaw, which proves useful when he has to jump
straight into the mouth of an oncoming shark. It looks pretty hopeless, but
fortunately this movie is educational: if you get eaten by a shark, just make
sure to have a chainsaw with you. You can just carve yourself right out if and
you’ll be fine, even if the outcome does look like a commercial for an abortion
clinic for fish.
So then the sun comes out and everything is cool, which means that by
killing that one shark, everything went back to normal. Even Nova somehow survived despite being eaten alive by a shark in midair. It's just a happy ending. Maybe the shark Fin killed was a super
villain shark who masterminded the whole thing. Of course!
This whole thing is just silly, and it’s supposed to be. The shark
scenes are fun and the action is generally okay for schlocky nonsense, but
mostly this movie is just kind of a waste of time. If you’re looking for
something ridiculous to watch, I’d recommend Shark Night 3D, Lake Placid 3 or
especially the 2000s Piranha remake over this; all of them are more
entertaining and have sillier moments. So even as a “campy” film this isn’t
that amazing. There are better options. Piranha is at least twice as funny as
this, and has better writing and more exciting stuff going on – a lot of this
movie I was just annoyed at the characters or bored at the amount of nothing
going on. Seriously, whose idea was it to put Tara Reid in this? What was up
with the constant overbearing whining in this thing? Did we really need a bunch
of scenes of people surfing or just driving around talking about how bad the
storm is?
Mostly the problem is that movies like this don’t really want to try
anymore. These movies should be hilarious, but instead it seems like the new normal
for horror-comedies is to just not give a shit about anything. If you have a
stupid idea for a story, what else do you need, right? You can just make a
shitty-ass movie with Z-grade acting and no entertaining parts outside of the
kill scenes and then complain that IT’S SUPPOSED TO BE BAD whenever someone
tries to criticize, right? No. That’s not true at all, and if you think that,
you need to go re-watch pretty much any 80s horror flick and learn how to do it
right.
A lack of quality in and of itself isn’t a substitute for humor and
good jokes, people. Just making your movie as shitty as possible doesn’t
constitute a schlocky, campy horror-comedy. If you want to make something
ridiculous, the answer isn’t annoying characters screaming at each other and
actors who are about as credible as late-night TV insurance scams. You have to
actually go all the way with it and exaggerate everything, make it funny and
over the top. You have to really keep the pace fast and the jokes funny, or
else it just becomes worthless crap. This movie has a few funny scenes. Most of it is just annoying or dull, like I said.
And I REALLY want to emphasize this one more time – if your defense of
movies like this, or other SyFy films, is that they’re supposed to be bad, well
I just don’t think that’s a good argument. Even the goofiest movies still have
to try at the basic tenets of
filmmaking, to be generally entertaining. Sharknado is mostly just a waste, and
although I’ve seen worse movies, I can’t recommend this one. Some people might
gripe that I’m taking things too seriously and wasting my time even reviewing
this at all, but hey, watching Sharknado in and of itself is a waste of time.
The images in this review are copyright of their original owners. I do not own any of them.
