Snow Sharks

A remote ski resort is terrorized by prehistoric man eating sharks after an avalanche. Yes really!

I'm been trying to figure out what makes a good bad movie (Sharknado) vs. a bad, bad movie (Avalanche Sharks)? I mean they're both B movies you watch for a laugh in a so-bad-its-good kinda way. They're also both about equal in terms of acting, direction, plot and special effects. Yet somehow Sharknado was fun to watch whereas Avalanche Sharks was just unwatchable.

In the end I made it through about half of this, I mean I had to see a few attacks, but the CGI is poorly (cheaply) done and while this is just a crappy B movie I still wanted a bit of an explanation as to how/why there were sharks living in the snow -they apparently came from space.

I still had fun guessing who gets eaten first and how; the babes getting it in the hot tub, the dude with the snow blower or the girls running from the advancing fin cruising through the snow.

After the initial curiosity wears off though there's not much left. 01.02.14

The first thing I noticed about this movie was that the people could actually act. I'm always amazed at how the "actors" in most of these shark movies are extremely unnatural but in this one they seem like this may not be their first time. This is actually as much a skiing movie as a shark movie, complete with the race to win the love of a girl. I wasn't expecting much and I was a little surprised that it wasn't worse than it is, although the end is absolutely ludicrous. I'd have to say this was not a total waste of time.

Avalanche Sharks (2014)

* 1/2 (out of 4)

A ski resort is hosting a bikini contest but they've got much bigger issues when sharks begin to come out of the snow and kill people.

I must admit that I love shark movies but the sad fact is that there really haven't been too many of them. Of course JAWS is a masterpiece and there are some other good ones like THE SHALLOWS but sadly small companies have realized that you can use bad CGI to create ugly looking sharks and throw them into any story line. This could be tornado sharks, sand sharks, sharks with three heads and in this case avalanche sharks.

Sadly this here is one of the least entertaining ones because the film spends way too much time with boring and annoying characters instead of focusing on the shark. The human characters are all extremely boring and they are all basically stereotypes that add no entertainment value. Even worse is the fact that at only 82-minutes the film drags from start to finish. I did enjoy the shark attacks and I thought the film would have benefited had there been a lot more.

Much similar in concept to the 2011 movie "Sand Sharks", which was also referenced in this movie, "Avalanche Sharks" is exactly what the name indicates. Well, without the avalanche, and just throw in snow instead. Yep, sharks swimming through snow and eating people. But these are no ordinary snow-swimming sharks, no... These are ethereal man-killers, brought about by ancient native American traditions.

The storyline is simple and straight forward; a bunch of people are enjoying spring break at a mountain skiing resort, when an ancient curse of sorts is set free and spirit sharks are set free to feast on the hapless vacationers.

For a storyline as this, you know what you get, and there are no great surprises here. And of course, it is as outrageous and far from realistic as it can be. But what do you expect with a concept such as this?

I will say that the special effects crew actually managed to pull it off nicely throughout "Avalanche Sharks". The sharks looked interesting and had some great details, and the effects themselves were good and seems real enough. And that really brought about a great deal of the enjoyment of the movie - as the storyline is a no brainer, and the acting was, well, it was there, lets just say that much...

"Avalanche Sharks" is a movie that is perfect for a lazy day on the couch, especially if you are nurturing a hangover and want to have some simple entertainment that require absolutely no brain activity.

So there has been sand sharks, swamp sharks, ghost sharks, super sharks, sharknados, avalanche sharks, and many, many other types of sharks, so where do we go next? Traffic sharks? Concrete Sharks? Space sharks? Unleash those toothy swimmers, and we, the audience, will be there to watch what is next...

Avalanche Sharks is not the worst shark movie out there but that in all honesty is saying very little because it is still a big failure on every level. Avalanche Sharks is a cheap-looking movie, granted yes with beautiful scenery(the only halfway-decent asset) but haphazard editing- to overkill effect in the attack scenes and even lousier special effects. Even toy sharks that you can have displayed in the bathroom are scarier than the shark designs here, which look more goofy and ridiculously over-sized than menacing. The sharks have very little personality either, never do they feel a threat all they do is attack without warning, the movie makes an attempt to explain their origins(which already makes it better than some shark movies out there) but it is written very clumsily and doesn't make sense. Despite all this, the they still manage to be much more likable than the human characters, all of whom are tired personality-deprived stereotypes who just frustrate you with their stupid actions and some not adding anything to the story. Every single one of the characters are terribly acted as well. Not that the writing and story are anything to write home about, the dialogue has a lot of repetition and padded filler and reeks of cheese, while the story is predictable, a mish-mash of ideas barely explored and insultingly ridiculous. The attack scenes range from mild fun, real stupidity and drawn-out boredom, most of which falling into the latter two categories, a couple very abrupt and blink-and-you'll miss them too, none of them tense or suspenseful. You can see them coming a mile away as well, and the conclusion is deeply underwhelming and didn't feel like an ending, the sharks are defeated too easily and too much by chance. To be honest though, I was so bored by the overall movie and so frustrated by the characterisation that I couldn't care less about how it ended. Oh and by the way, if you are looking for a bikini contest like promised you are best avoiding Avalanche Sharks, and if you do you are not missing a thing, that is how bad Avalanche Sharks is. 1/10 for the scenery only. Bethany Cox