Sharkman

Hammerhead is a combination between the mad scientist and killer shark movie genres. In a bit of type-casting, Jeffrey Combs plays the aforementioned mad scientist who develops a human/hammerhead shark creature. Bizarrely, this being is in fact his son, who he has turned into this monster to prevent him dying from cancer. Or something.

A group of associates are invited to the scientist's private island. They end up being used as shark bait or shark mate. For some unknown reason the head of IT has been brought along as part of this team. Who knows why? Luckily, he turns out to be a resourceful, if somewhat overweight, Ramboesque hero. I'm working on the assumption that he learnt how to handle an assault rifle as part of his day job working in 1st line support. A normal day for this IT man presumably involves fixing someone's network connection followed by a call to gun down gun-toting evil-doers. Or perhaps a call to fix someone's PC has to be scheduled between physical confrontations with land-based human-shark hybrids? Anyway, he's amazing and saves the day. He even get's the girl.

The shark-man is a slightly lame creation but OK, I guess, judging by the effects in general in this film. And the movie moves on at a decent pace. It's complete hokum of course but if you buy a movie called Hammerhead and expect it to be a complex drama about the emotional conflicts experienced by a man turned into a land-based killer fish, then really you have no one to blame but yourself. As it is, there are guns, gore, girls and possibly even an exploding helicopter. It's rubbish but not as bad as some might say.

A scientist on an island is in deep sorrow about the loss of his son who died of kidney cancer. So he thinks: why not turn my dead son into a hammerhead shark. Well, who wouldn't? It's a little hard to cope with the fact that the hammerhead shark that's killing everybody is constantly being called "Paul". Also, William Forsythe's cast as a MacGyver-kick-ass-savingtheday- kinda hero lacks credibility. On the other hand there are a few hot chicks who make you actually look at the screen while shark Paul bites another one to death. As a matter of fact I find bad b-movies quite amusing. But for my taste it would have been a much better movie if it was made for say 1000000 bucks less. Then it might have been fun.

When I heard about "Hammerhead" being released on DVD and finally found it at my local DVD store, I thought "well, just another cheap monster movie from Nu Image". Those guys around Boaz Davidson and Avi Lerner produced cheap but very entertaining B - Pictures in the past few months but also some very disappointing movies. So I didn't expect much, especially after having watched the rather disappointing "Shark Zone" just a few days before. But "Hammerhead" turned out to be an excellent revival of the 1950s monster movies. We have a mad scientist, a group of people in a dangerous situation, screaming women and damsels in distress, man-eating plants and of course we have the creature, a huge mutant mix between a man and a hammerhead shark. Everything you need for an entertaining monster movie. The only thing missing are graphic sex scenes and nudity which you expect in movies of this kind, but since the movie was made for TV it's understandable why these scenes are missing. And it doesn't matter anyway cause "Hammerhead" is action and horror entertainment at it's best. There are two reasons why I gave it seven out of ten points, though: First of all, the monster isn't seen very often and the showdown with the destruction of the creature is too fast and poorly done, and secondly, William Forsythe just isn't the right guy for the "hero" part and for falling in love with gorgeous Hunter Tylo. Other than that, I can highly recommend this movie for any monster movie fan out there. Grab yourselves a cool drink and some popcorn, watch this movie and have fun. Jasper P. Morgan

this movie wasn't absolutely atrocious, but it was pretty bad. the acting ACTUALLY was pretty good! jeffrey combs did a pretty darn good job as the mad scientist, which is sort of his specialty if you don't know such things :D. bill forsythe .. well, i'm not EXACTLY sure why he was in this film. he's way too good for this kinda stuff, and his role wasn't exactly demanding. I rented this on the strength of those two leads, and I wasn't really disappointed. I mean, heck, it's a movie about a half man/half shark. It ain't Shakespeare folks. Other than the plot, which is full of holes, and the poor dialogue, I would like to note that the cinematography also left many things to be desired. there were shots were they were trying to look "cool", but it ended up obscuring the scene or just coming off plain cheezy. they also blew it many times when they had decent dialogue and cut away prematurely before the person could even deliver the line. it was pretty bad. but if you are a jeffrey combs fan, this one is worth checking out. he gives a great performance and does what he can with the character. forsythe ain't bad either, and either is the female lead. heck if i can remember her name though. bottom line, i wouldn't otherwise waste your time.

I would have given this a 2 or 3 except that it is great fun to watch Jeffrey Combs reprise a wacky scientist/doctor reminiscent of Herbert West. Plus there's the added bonus of William Forsythe, that ordinary looking, chubby, everyday man who gets the girl, and whose talent is better than this type of material. The effects are also above average for this type of low-budget material. Combs shows here how great he could have been as a horror icon had he been backed by somebody like Roger Corman, or a Hammer studio, or if he'd been at Universal in the 30s and 40s. It's easy to see him reciting the Colin Clive quote, "It's alive...alive!", or as a Peter Cushing type of character, or as Professor Quatermass. He's just not quite as good as a hero, take a look at Dr. Mordrid and you'll see why.