Le Chasseur de monstres

Franco Nero goes platinum blonde, dons a strange wig and heads for the Caribbean in a frankly bizarre and not entirely successful outing for Enzo Castellari.

Nero is The Shark Hunter, a mysterious fellow on the island who appeared from nowhere but is rather good at catching sharks. He's got his girlfriend, who has caught the eye of local thug/potential rapist Werner Pochath, who works for local crime lord Gomez. Nero has found something out there in the sea, and he's suddenly got loads of people following him.

Following a requisite bar fight with Pochath, Nero begins to work with a happy-go-lucky guy who has the diving experience and the gear to dive over three hundred metres. This guy seems trustworthy, so Nero reveals that what's down there is plane with one hundred million dollars in it. When asked what he'd do with the money, the guy says he'd spend it on orphanages and hospitals for the poor. Care to guess what happens to him?

Gomez wants to get his hands on the money, as does a stranger American fellow who arrived on the island. Can Nero get to the money and suck it out of the sea using that vacuum gadget and that huge inflatable ball? Would that even work in real life?

There's still the question of who Nero is and why he knows the money is there, and that gives him a chance to do his near-crying acting and have a few flashbacks. There's not much in the way of gunplay in this one but Enzo Castellari does get to punch Franco Nero right in the face. I wonder if that's why he gave himself such a big role? Some frustrations with his actors rising to the surface there.

Werner Pochath makes a good bad guy so we don't need to worry about that, but there's something strangely lacking from this one. I could have sworn it was aimed at kids until the end where people started getting eaten by sharks and harpooned in the chest. It's not a bad film, don't get me wrong - it's just not Castellari at his best.

Strange credits too - F. Nero? W. Pochath? Did they run out of money or something?

I'm a lifelong 'judge a B-Movie by its bodacious-looking cover' guy, and I'm big enough to admit, this foolishness has oft led me astray, but any genre film created by Enzo Castellari & Franco Nero is a guarantee of excellence! While, perhaps, more than a little inspired by Peter Yates's The Deep, The Shark Hunter is a boisterously entertaining Euro-Snapper in its own right! The blue-eyed Monsignor of macho, Franco Nero, replete with a bountiful blonde coif, armed only with his depthless testosterone and a humble spear, goes mano a Squalo with unrivalled manliness in Castellari's thrilling deep sea treasure hunt.

Let's be honest, if you are about to experience an unwanted intimacy with man scoffing sharks, who better to call than Django, dude? If celluloid hadn't been thus far invented, The Shark Hunter's righteously entertaining premise would strongly demand it! Highpoints: phooken everything, dude, for real, but The Shark Hunter gets bonus points for Guido & Maurizio De Angelis's uncommonly sweet score, and Werner Pochath's sleazy reptilian hood makes the sharks look like tadpoles! Interestingly, Franco Nero's bluff Shark Hunter returned much later for more maritime mayhem in 'Killer Mermaids'.

Decent enough mob flick/ Jaws ripoff, has Franco Nero sporting a supremely annoying, floppy wig, scouring the waters around small islands in the Caribbean, searching for millions of dollars, the result of a plane crash. Other searchers, as well as corrupt politicians, turn up looking for it as well- despite the fact that it is believed to be located in shark-infested waters. Well photographed in the Caribbean, and with a few good action scenes, but there is a few long stretches of nothing in between the action, and the music is sometimes effective and sometimes almost comically overpowering.

Overall, it is good, but nothing really memorable.

Actor Franco Nero and director Enzo G. Castellari made it again with this film.

After some very interesting films like "High Crime", "Cry,Onion" and "Keoma", Castellari and Nero worked together in this great, brilliant adventure or action film, as you like. The beautiful photography, the wonderful music and fine acting make this film most enjoyable.

Franco Nero does a great performance as usual... Eduardo Fajardo performs a very bad and cruel villain as usual too... This film has many great underwater scenes, car chasing, fights, and a solid plot, oh... and a quite surprising ending.

Who can ask for anything more??...

It´s absolutely worthwhile watching it!!.

A great Castellari with Franco Nero as a retired shark hunter! The soundtrack is A+ (another great tube from Guido and Maurizio De Angelis). Also, Take a look at Castellari, in a cameo, punching Nero in slow-motion near the end of the Movie! A must see for Nero and Castellari fans.