Shark Porn

Ever notice how Lou Diamond Phillips looks just like porn legend Peter North? From the neck up, anyway.

In the rogue shark movie Red Water (2003), Lou plays a charter boat captain in Louisiana in financial trouble because his business is seasonal and his customers aren’t. He used to work on oil rigs, but they had a blow out and two guys were killed. It wasn’t Lou’s fault, but he blames himself and traded his hot wife and career to own a stinky boat that barely floats. I probably would’ve done the same thing, but kept the hot wife (in case the boat quit working and we needed to be rowed back to land).

Speaking of which, she shows up as a rep for the EPA wanting to charter his boat so she can keep tabs on the oil drilling going on up river. Lou’s hot ex-wife is played by Kristy Swanson, the original and ONLY Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Also in the drilling zone is three million dollars scuttled when the feds were closing in on a drug run gone horribly awry.

Now the drug dealer who owns the spending rights wants it all back and hires a shark-bitten scuba expert/criminal to retrieve it. He also sends rap icon Coolio along to keep an eye on things. Coolio has played good guys before, but he really shines here as a gangsta thug brandishing a gun to cap yo’ ass and using appropriate street talk to get his point across.

Prior to these soon-to-cross scenarios, a 12-foot bull shark has made it up river and has eaten several people. I see you waving a red flag here: sharks are salt water fish. Not so fast — bull sharks are ambidextrous. The criminals clash with Lou, resulting in a MANY opportunities to bleed in the water. To a hungry shark, that’s like a refreshing human beverage to wash down its hourly meals.

Realistic criminal behavior, all-purpose explosions and enlarged fish attacks build up to a well-staged climax. Lou’s past factors in nicely on the final face-off with the shark (which looks like its made of some sort of water-proof rubber when it launches (!) out of the water to eat people).

The oil drill, it should be noted, looks to be of Peter North proportions, if you catch my drift. But it’s the snappy dialogue and double-crossing gangstas that are the real heroes here.

Ghost Shark: Bites From Beyond

2013’s Ghost Shark is memorable for a number of reasons, sub-budget special effects/dialogue/acting notwithstanding. But first you have to ignore the plot, which gives Ghost Shark its rai·son d’ê·tre.

After being fed a hand grenade thrown from a fishing boat by redneck a-holes, Ghost Shark’s corpse floats into a half-submerged cave where early settlers performed satanic rituals. (Okay, what?) It is here Dead Shark is converted into a glowing, transparent kill-beast able to trans-morph out of any body of water, be it a fire hydrant, bath tub, swimming pool, mud puddle and even a bottled water drinking fountain. And this is exactly what makes Ghost Shark’s 84 minutes of dumbassery entertaining.

GS crashes a pool party and devours teenagers. GS opens wide and swallows little kids on a Slip ’n Slide™, an unsuspecting youngster shooting down the shark’s throat as if a human oyster on the half shell. A mayor’s assistant pouring himself a cool and refreshing paper cup of thirst quenching death after GS leaves the bottled water container and is delivered to the assistant’s insides, where it splits the guy in half during the chewing out. (This scene alone is worth an Academy Award.)

Time wasters until Ghost Shark straps on the feedbag: a drunk lighthouse keeper, savaged by guilt for killing his wife in said satanic cave years ago who seeks revenge on GS. Not sure how that works. The smack-talking mayor going on a Jaws-driven balance-of-justice boat ride. (His crunchy death – being sucked down a watery toilet – as a true feel-good moment.) Tthen there’s the never-ending parade of young girls in bikinis and a really, really fat guy riding a jet ski that looked like it might get permanently lodged into FG’s ass crack on the next wave.

Back to the bikinis: Most horror films feature young gals in their 20s, probably still in community college or of X-rated movie age. Not so with Ghost Shark; The girls running around in kite string swimsuits are barely (heh) in high school. I felt somewhat dirty watching Ghost Shark make fish bait out of jail bait. I would’ve showered my shame away afterward, but hey – Ghost Shark possibly coming through the nozzle.

P.S. Ghost Shark 2: Urban Jaws (pending 2015) is not a sequel or related to Ghost Shark. It’s an indie movie (i.e., made with two New Zealand guys and a Best Buy™ video camera) that was supposed to have come out in 2010. Time to put down the Foster’s mates, and show us some of your Down Under horror. Okay, that didn’t come out right.

Nature Eats You – And Likes It

A recipe for fun: a handful of obnoxious teens on Spring Break, alcohol, and a houseboat on a lake that harbors a PMS-ing, super-sized crocodile. Seems the croc’s eggs have been made into omelets by some local hicks, thereby fanning the flames of her discontent.

One of the teens finds an unbroken egg and sticks it up the backpack of a hot chick who won’t take her clothes off. Everywhere she goes, so goeth the croc (whose name is Flat Dog, according to local legend). The beast itself is computer generated and isn’t altogether menacing. Its breath, however, is another story. It also pulls a Free Willy and jumps (!) over a boat. Then it turns around and eats half the pleasure craft, along with the motor, occupants, and life-saving devices. Yum.

Predictably, several teens get chomped upon (graphically enough to warrant a quick rewind); but no one gets naked, no one has sex, and everybody runs around b*tching and screaming like they were in the Blair Witch Project (1999).

The best scene has the croc gulping down a teen whole, then throwing him up later – intact and unscathed, save for a bunch of crocodile stomach goop all over his face and skateboarder street wear.

Crocodile’s (2000) tally: passable gore, toothless special effects, painful acting. Final score: gator 8 (or “ate” – heh), viewer 0.