What better way is there to spend your night than watching the ultimate duo of shark-based horror movies – Ghost Shark and Sharknado – with a group of friends? Trick question, there isn’t a better way! I really enjoy indulging in bad horror movies. The poor acting, the bad dialogue, the implausible situations… and if nothing else, they give inspiration that anyone can truly can make a movie! (Seriously, how do you get to make a TV horror movie? Someone tell me the career path so I can start working toward it.)
To make a real night of it (or “reel” night of it, da da boom tsh), I put together some appropriately themed snacks
Gummy sharks swimming in blue jelly.
A capsicum octopus with olive tentacle rings, swimming in a sea of hummus (and extra dipping snacks). I also cut up some pineapple into fish and star fish, but didn’t get a good picture of it. You can sort of see it in the background of the below shot of our tropical drinks.
Ghost Shark
Basic summary: The movie begins in the American town of New Port, and starts off in a style reminiscent of the TV show 1,00o Ways To Die – terrible acting, trying too hard to make you hate the characters, dramatic zooms and the characters’ deaths teleprompted. Two ‘yokel’ fisherman are trying to reel in a super-sized fish that will win them a cash prize, when suddenly great white eats the fish that was on their line. Outraged, and being yokels and what-not, they violently murder* the shark. However, moments later the shark comes back as a ghost to avenge its own death. The town of New Port is then plagued by a series of horrific deaths where the bodies of the victims are all found by various-sized bodies of water (and I mean various, think swimming pool, bath, toilet, glass of water…)
Movie highlights: I could sooner choose my favourite star in the sky than chose my favourite part in the movie. It would be a toss-up of when a sheriff drinks a glass of water and Ghost Shark explodes out of his head:
The protagonists being terrorised by a group of twelve year olds:
You came to the wrong neighbourhood, motherfucker
And this weedy guy who was mysteriously cast as a tough guy and wearing sweet shorts:
We laughed for a long time at that guy. Good times. I also appreciated that the ringleader in bringing down Ghost Shark was a moxie teenage girl, rather atypical for a horror movie of this quality.
Movie low lights: The acting is bad and the production quality is super low, however, this added to the movie’s overall charm.
Shark bites out of 10: For entertainment value, I give Ghost Shark 8 shark bites out of 10.
*Can you murder a shark? Well, they did.
Sharknado
The highlights: I had been wanting to watch this movie for a long time, so it had a lot of expectation to live up to. My high expectations, coupled with watching it directly after the masterpiece that is Ghost Shark, meant the movie subsequently fell a little flat. The basic gist of the movie is that a tropical weather event has hearded large schools of sharks into LA waters. When the cyclone causes the town to flood, sharks begin to cause terror amongst the beautiful people of LA. The situation worsens when water spouts turn into tornadoes, throwing sharks of all manner in every which way. What a right pickle! The creme de la creme scene in the movie would have to be when a shark flying through the air gets sliced in half by a chainsaw:
Movie low lights: While the film production quality and acting shits all over Ghost Shark, the movie didn’t delight me as much as I thought it would. I think one of the reasons I like watching horror is for the innovation in it; the ability for the filmmaker to be absolutely ludicrous and try outlandish special effects, plot devices, unconventional casting, etc and get away with it. While I enjoyed the tornado carrying sharks and the chopping of a flying shark in half with a chainsaw, the movie didn’t do anything to dispel racial stereotypes (hello, Australian whose phrase is ‘bloody hell’) or gender stereotypes (I don’t know what I was expecting with the casting of Tara Reid). There wasn’t much deviation from standard horror-action movie plot devices or characters. With sharks roaming free in a city, there seemed so much ripe potential for terror and hilarity that I felt the movie didn’t capitalise on.
Shark bites out of 10: I give Sharknado 6.5 chainsaw-chipped shark bites out of 10.
Overall, it was a delightful evening. We are thinking about doing a giant snake themed horror night next time. Stay tuned, folks!
curiouscatharsis 