Jaws in Japan

If you watch this pile of Crap I promise you'll be annoyed, annoyed that you allowed yourself watch an hour of this so called movie. I can't genuinely think of a positive thing to say, aside from the interesting opening scenery which shows a little bit of imagination. The acting is terrible, the Shark isn't what you'd expect. I understand they ran into some legal problems for using the Jaws name, this would even tarnish Jaws the Revenge, if you're looking for some Shark thrills watch Sharknado instead, this makes it look like Jaws. Horrific hour of my life wasted.

JAWS IN JAPAN (PSYCHO SHARK) While America has produced 100's of killer shark B-movies Asia surprisingly hasn't. Shark attacks are actually very rare in Japan and this is the only J-shark movie I've been able to find.

Have you ever wanted to watch a film that captures that feeling of boredom of sitting, sleeping in a hotel room with nothing to do? Then this movie is for you! Unfortunately for most who seek out this movie they weren't searching for an Asian or Euro Art film. NO they came for a shark film. And if it weren't for the title you'd be forgiven to think you were watching an incompetent J-horror found footage film, a student film attempt a psychological thriller OR more likely you'd think you were just watching someones raw video footage of their Okinawa beach vacation.

The protagonists are two young women on vacation in Okinawa. They aren't your scrawny Japanese types but full bodied, vivacious women. They're hard to distinguish from each other as they both have similar facial features, body types and long hair. Even tho there's lots of scenes of them bantering with each other we learn nothing about them and we're given no distinct personality traits to tell them apart. Tho we do get lots of cleavage shots.

All the scenes last way too long - with no story points or plot and many scenes are repeated adding more padding to the movie. Most of the movie is video 'found footage' but the movie also switches to locked off omnipresent-view shots. 30 minutes in nothing much happens, it's honestly like watching someones unedited vacation footage. There is a serial killer Psycho POV type shower scene (is it a land shark? the spirit of the shark?). About 36 min we finally see a bad CG shark fin indicating that indeed this is supposed to be a shark movie (filmmakers using VFX pay attention to EYELINE! Where is your actor looking at)

One of the main characters then spends much of her time watching a video tape she finds in the room and in RINGU like scenes watches another group of young Japanese beach vacationers who also become main characters - tho none of the characters are given any personality traits.

The women are seduced by a young local guy named Kenji and we are hinted this has something to do with a shark. Watch out for those charming local beach boys! There's some evil afoot but did the filmmakers really want to make a shark movie?

At 1 hour 10 min JAWS IN JAPAN could prob be re-cut into an artsy 5 min psychological thriller short.

Just to clarify. The film has a running time of one hour and six minutes, which is set entirely on land. Not an exaggeration, just a fact. This should warn you how little shark action there is. NONE!

This film is based on the false premise that even a bad 'Jaws' rip off is still a 'Jaws' rip off. How hard can it be? All you need is a giant killer shark eating people. Cut, print!

After seeing over 30 sharkxploitation films I know this isn't true. 'Jaws' rip offs can be bad. Really really really bad!!! Like 'Cruel Jaws' or 'The Last Shark.' This one takes the prize.

It's more a rip off of 'Paranormal Inactivity' than it is 'Jaws.' Hence it's really really bad. It's a "found footage" film of girls on vacation filming themselves. So it's not as painful as 'Paranormal Activity' because they're speaking Japanese so the characters are less annoying.

Scary music plays when the girls are either taking a shower or alone in their hotel rooms. Begging the question, who's filming this? Why is scary music playing? The killer isn't Jason, it's a shark. The shark isn't going to break into their hotel room! We know this!

This might actually have made sense of the girls were out on a yacht where the shark could attack them. But chartering a boat would require actual money from the film makers.

The rest of the film is also ON LAND! The first rule of a sharkxploitation film is to get your characters out on the water where they can be eaten! The shark can't come ashore!

The supposed "action" scenes are also on LAND! That's right. They're in three feet of water on the beach when the shark shows up! This isn't scary! They can walk away! A great white can't get you in three feet of water! This isn't scary!

Just to clarify. The film has a running time of one hour and six minutes, which is set entirely on land! Not an exaggeration, just a fact. This should warn you how little action there is.

At least the film does barrow from 'Baywatch's success. Silicone, silicone, and even more silicone! This is exploited for all it's worth with tons of scenes of the girls jumping up and down screaming for help and even a scene where a knife is held by cleavage. Yes, they're all Japanese girls which makes this even funnier.

Don't watch this film!

What can I say about this? It starts like a found footage film, dipping into what could almost be an homage to The Ring. Then loses its way even more. We are subjected to repeated footage and aimless progression towards the inevitable "shark" attack. I don't know if the dialogue was as trite and as forced in the original Japanese as it is in the subtitles, but it's pretty dire.

I can only assume this is someone's backyard attempt at a new take on Jaws. As such, it's probably fine if the intent was to show his mates over a few beers.

If you're going to watch it, I suggest getting the DVD so at least you'll get a nice coaster for your troubles.

Of any category of low-grade genre fare, I don't know if there's any more consistently dubious than the shark flick. Steven Spielberg's 'Jaws' set a standard that few successors have ever come close to matching, and most filmmakers just don't even bother trying. 'Avalanche sharks,' 'Shark exorcist,' 'Sharknado,' '5-headed shark attack,' 'Sharkansas women's prison massacre,' and countless kindred works do the absolute bare minimum to somehow make a quick buck; add to that list 2009's 'Psycho shark,' also known as 'Jaws in Japan.' It's not that there is no value whatsoever throughout the diminutive length - it's that the value is perfectly negligible, and functionally meaningless, and... You know what, nevermind, just don't ever bother with this tripe. However bad you think it might be, very plainly, it's emphatically worse. I'm genuinely embarrassed to say that I watched.

Flashes of imagery in the first few minutes are intended to excite, so it's too bad that there is no meaning or weight attached to them as they present right off the bat; because of how poorly made this is, additional instances to come are no better. Touches of the music are rather flavorful, but only bits and piece. Between the cinematography and direction some shots are perhaps a tad unconventional, and could have been interesting - if there were any purpose at all to their usage. In theory the actresses are charming, but they are given roles of empty-headed nothing, and it's readily apparent that they were cast not for any acting ability which is never particularly called upon here, but only for their bodies. Given how the female characters are written and how the perpetual Male Gaze visualizes them, it seems that this "movie" was literally developed and executed by twelve year old boys. This would also explain why the "plot" is almost fully devoid of cohesiveness or substance, and why the majority of the runtime is nothing more than footage of scantily-clad young women.

The coastal landscape is nice. There were fractions of slivers of fragments of shades of workable ideas here - which, by the way, have nothing at all to do with sharks. I have no additional praise I could offer, no matter how hard I try. It's true that 'Psycho shark' is one of the very worst things I've ever watched, an exercise in pointless, appalling dreck for which even the mere suggestion of a "bottom of the barrel" rating for quality is several steps too far. Even that is not condemnation enough, though; in watching there is only one other film to come to mind that was this stupefyingly foul and excruciating, and it is something so contemptible that I refuse to even say its name. Because of what fleeting, infinitesimal, ephemeral thoughts did go into this picture, it may in some measure be an indistinguishable degree better than that unnameable abomination. Yet if this is what it takes to summon some nanoscopic iota of assessment that isn't purely withering, then there's really not much point in postulating a distinction, is there?

I don't necessarily mind that the name, promotional material, and scenario are misleading; if a feature is done well, I can definitely get on board with metaphors, hidden meanings, and red herrings. I do mind that this is such putrescent, vacuous, aimless, inconsequential, impotent, fruitless rubbish - the cinematic equivalent of a crash test dummy in a loaded garbage truck that's on fire as it rolls downhill into a sewage treatment plant - that any conceivable earnest value it may have claimed is wholly quashed. Something deserving could have hypothetically been extracted from what 'Psycho shark' ended up being. For that to have happened, however, would have required for every single person involved here to have been replaced with individuals of baseline skill, intelligence, and mental and physiological maturity who cared about what they were making. In our reality, unfortunately, the end result is just rotten, godawful trash that no one should ever watch, and for which all contributors should be continuously castigated and forever blacklisted from cinema and television. Rarely have I so deeply regretted a decision to watch something. You've been warned.