Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus

I normally only watch the bigger budget movies with a few art house type sprinkled in, but I had heard about this title somewhere, so when I saw it at the video store I thought, what the heck? how bad could it be? The answer: Amazingly bad. Phenomenally bad. Utterly horrific. Not the worst movie ever, but close. When your movie wishes it was as good as Battlefield Earth, you know you have a problem. It wasn't even the good kind of bad, where you can laugh at the unintentional humor.

The good: Still trying to come up with something The bad: I know this is a low budget D-list movie, but come on - the effects and CGI were stunningly bad. They looked like they were done on my laptop over a weekend. They might have been acceptable in the early 90s.

To make it even worse, many of the CGI scenes were constantly repeated. Whenever the shark or octopus attacked, you usually saw it preparing or approaching for the attack several times using the exact same footage. Sometimes they even bothered to mirror image the scene to make it look different.

So many of the details were amazingly unrealistic. The dialogue was bad, the way people behaved and delivered lines, physics (as in what animals of that size could actually do), torpedoes were like firecrackers, etc.

Quality control was obviously lacking. When the shark approaches a battleship from the side, the ship is shown firing forward. Once, during a video call, for about a second a film crew member wearing a headset pops into existence beside the person on the call, and then disappears. The caller and those working in the background are obviously oblivious to this phantom man.

There was this laughably bad science scene where the main characters keep dumping vials of various colored liquids into test tubes of other colored stuff and then they all looked disappointed. This happened over and over for like 5 minutes. All without any dialogue or any clue as to what they were actually doing. We only knew they were looking for a "solution" to the problem of giant sea monsters. I guess dumping red goo into a vat of blue gunk and having it not turn a different color is not a solution to giant sea monsters. Gosh, I am glad they tried that, it might have worked! There was an embarrassingly bad romance side plot thrown in, and the build up to the final showdown was dull, and then that showdown was short and filled with repeats of the same footage over and over.

I almost never feel strongly enough about a movie to write a review, but for this one I had to. If I prevent even one person from seeing this movie, then I have done my job.

Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus (2009)

1/2 (out of 4)

In the good tradition of the grindhouse era, if you make a great title people are going to pay to see it. That's pretty much what happened with this horrid film, which became a cult item even before it was released due to the trailer being posted on YouTube and quickly becoming a hit. Once again I was suckered into a rental but hopefully others will stay away. The movie has a prehistoric shark and octopus breaking free, causing destruction and in the end fighting to the death. Oh yeah, Lorenzo Lamas and Debbie Gibson (yes, that one) star. Asylum, the group behind this movie, are experts at ripping off other movies with titles such as THE TERMINATORS, THE DAY THE EARTH STOPPED and STREET RACER. This here must have been their shot at doing something "original" but no matter what they were trying to do the end result is a complete mess of a movie, which features horrible acting and some of the worst CGI effects I've ever seen. This is the type of "B" movie that should make you laugh and at least deliver a good time but instead I walked away from this thing highly mad. Why? Because the thing is so cheap that they don't even include full attacks. We will see the shark jumping out of the water and attacking a plane yet we don't see the aftermath. The octopus attacks a large station yet we don't see what happens. The shark goes after a Navy ship, we see one bite but nothing else. There's a scene where the Golden Gate Bridge is attacked but we don't see it. Even the fight between the two monsters is extremely poorly done and that includes reusing the same footage over and over! The only reason this film avoids a BOMB rating is because of the scene where the shark jumps out of the water and attacks the plane. The sight of this is so incredibly bad that I couldn't help but start laughing. The performances are all really bad and that includes Gibson who seems to be confused by what she's doing. There are plenty of good "when nature attack" movies out there and there are many good "direct to DVD" titles out there but this sucker fails on both levels. This is a complete waste of time but at least the producers were smart enough to come up with a great title to get people like me to lay down their cash.

I'm sure that most of the people who have seen this film were suckered in by the trailer, which became an Internet viral-video smash earlier this year. How could you not want to see it after watching the clip of a gargantuan shark jumping out of the ocean and attacking an airliner? Giant Monster Movies have always brought out my inner 8 year old, and "Mega Shark Vs. Giant Octopus" was no exception. Is it a good movie? Of course not. But is it a fun movie? Oh, hell yes. For Z-grade direct to video aficionados like myself, this flick is manna from Heaven. I've read much about the notorious production house "The Asylum" (and its celebrated "mockbuster" ripoffs of more famous movies) over the past few months but this is the first film of theirs I've seen. I hate to admit it, but after seeing "Mega Shark" I am now curious enough to investigate some of their other works like "Transmorphers" or "The Terminators". (I must be in dire need of medication.) As you'd expect from a movie made on a six-pack budget, "Mega Shark" is not exactly a feast for the eyes. The special effects are minimal (done mostly in cheap C.G.I.), and the title monsters tend to look like bathtub toys swimming around in dirty dishwater. The human cast isn't much more interesting, although former '80s teen queen Deborah (a.k.a. Debbie) Gibson seems to be having fun with her role as a crusading oceanographer who is pressed into government service (by perennial Direct To Video mainstay Lorenzo Lamas) to help rid the oceans of the two monstrous creatures. Teamed up with her former professor (played by an Irishman doing what appears to be a low-rent Sean Connery imitation) and a Japanese colleague (played by an Asian guy doing an equally low rent George Takei imitation), the three spout a near endless stream of unintentionally hilarious dialog (at least I hope it's unintentional) to pad out run time between the too-short scenes of monstrous mayhem. Mega Shark devours a hunk of the Golden Gate Bridge in addition to his airliner snack, whilst Giant Octopus destroys an offshore oil rig, then the pair team up to destroy a few battleships and submarines full of overacting extras before they turn on each other in what is supposed to be a Battle Royale but in reality takes up approximately two minutes of film. A romantic sub-plot between Debbie and Japanese Scientist Guy is jammed in out of nowhere, apparently so that Debbie has someone to snuggle up with on the beach at the end of the film. Needless to say, I laughed my way through the entire movie. Now that I think about it, The Asylum probably should've teamed with Toho Productions to make this film -- I can only imagine what the "Godzilla" special effects team could've done with this concept. Basically, if you're a lover of bad monster cinema, you need to see "Mega Shark Vs. Giant Octopus" at least once. Otherwise, you're better off sticking with watching the trailer over and over on YouTube. All the best parts of the movie are in it anyway.

This is one incredibly bad direct to video monster flick (though "bad direct to video monster flick" is probably a redundant term). It has all the classic earmark of the worst DTV has to offer--horrible screenplay, idiotic dialog, lots of talking in lieu of action, that incredibly annoying "avid fart" digital editing, bad grade z cast, Ed Wood level acting and directing, and GC effects that any grade schooler would almost be proud of. Now, this piece of S could have been entertaining despite the abundance of retarded MST3K-worthy acting, writing and direction if ONLY they had sprung for more than five minutes of footage featuring the title monsters. Imagine if King Kong V Godzilla had only featured the title monsters in short three to five second blips and the all out battle between them takes all of eleven seconds from start to finish. Now double how much that would suck and that would be the equivalent of this "film."

To sum up--and incredibly bad, incredibly amateur hunk of junk that would be moronically entertaining if it just weren't so damned boring.

This is definitely the film to see drunk with a few mates. Yeah it's pretty lame but what the heck... it's also a lot of fun. Suspend all belief and go with the schlock. The effects are pretty woeful but that's what makes it fun. Unfortunately the editing of all the major action is done so quickly that you don't get a chance to revel in it's outrageousness. Just when the creatures do something really cool like bite the Golden Gate bridge the scene cuts to something else. I want more from my "millions of years trapped in ice giant monsters of the deep." You also get the feeling that all involved know exactly what a pile of B grade celluloid they're turning out. Two thing I've learnt however is next time i fly I'll be looking out for massive leaping sharks and never call an octopus a squid. Surprisingly Debbie Gibson is really good... not as an octopus but as an actor. I'm now a fan. I can't wait for the sequel. It rises...