Shark Week: Sand Sharks

Sand Sharks is pretty much what you get when you combine Super Shark with Snow Shark. Basically take Super Shark and stick it in the ground. I can start by saying, it's certainly better than both of those movies.

For starters, the dialogue in this movie is actually pretty well written,with little exception. Unlike Snow Shark, the characters interact in a seemingly non-forced way and, unlike Super Shark, most of the science bits didn't come off as if they were just making up words (It's called Wumbology and I still can't believe you haven't heard of it). Yeah, this movie tries to dazzle and baffle as well. They try their darndest to make the audience understand how the sharks can move and survive in the sand and whatever but it still feels sort of out of place considering how stupid the concept is and there's no mention at all about where the sharks came from or why they've never been seen before. But at the very least, they did try to make some sense of it and they pulled it off better than they did in Super Shark.

What this movie does have that the others do not is enough shark/sand related puns to make your head explode.

"I would've never guessed she was such a shark."

"This spring break is really going to bite."

"Better watch out she might come biting for your job."

"I'm going to see what I can dig up."

"I'm still the big fish in this pond."

And on and on and on. If you're still not convinced, one of the main characters name is Sandy Powers. Durr..

That Sandy Powers by the way is played by Brooke Hogan who has starred in other fondly remembered classics such as Two-Headed Sharks and Avalanche Sharks. But speaking of the acting, it's actually pretty good in this movie and by "pretty good" please understand that I'm grading this on the shark-movie scale. The characters are actually defined from each other and it's certainly a hell of a lot better than Snow Sharks and a bit better than Super Shark as well. The only character I could say is actually memorable was Corin Nemec as Jimmy Green. If you look up that name on IMDb, you may recognize him as that guy that you're totally going to beat the shit out of because he tried to hit on your girlfriend at a club. His character is such a cliche douchebag that it hurts just looking at him but it's actually pretty funny and he plays the jerkoff well.

But we don't watch a shark movie for the writing or the acting, oh no, we watch a shark movie for the mother-fucking sharks.

You don't get a really clear look at them at any point, whereas in Super Shark we get plenty of time to check the bastard out, but the screen time is innumerably longer than Snow Shark so it's not that bad. Despite looking more like enlarged catfish than sharks, the special effects are passable mainly because at this point I'm so desensitized to horrendously rendered fish that it doesn't faze me anymore. Sharks change sizes, they jump out of magical sand puffballs, severed heads are obviously placed in digitally, yeah, yeah. Obviously no one would say they're good but they're not completely laughable.

What I think is weird is that this movie actually bears a striking resemblance to Jaws. I wrote down a few of the similarities.

1. Movie takes place on an island.
2. Shark goes around picking off random people.
3. Town meeting is held, everyone argues about what to do about the shark.
4. Sheriff is the only one who thinks there's a shark.
5. Wants to close beaches.
6. Mayor wants beaches to stay open.
7. Annual party that keeps the town's economy alive is starting soon.
8. Meeting is interrupted by Robert Shaw lookalike who says he'll kill the shark if the reward is greatly increased.
9. Sheriff calls in a shark expert.
10. Everyone goes out to kill the shark.
11. One guy comes back with a dead shark that's hung by it's tail over a pier.
12. Dead shark is examined by the shark expert.
13. Dead shark is not the shark that's been killing people.
14. Big party happens anyway.
15. Shit goes down at the big party.
16. Shark is killed via explosion.

Seriously, even the poster is the same.

And if that wasn't enough, the tagline is "JUST WHEN YOU THOUGHT YOU WERE SAFE OUT OF THE WATER..." Now, most of this obviously could be chalked up simply to references and nods to the original masterpiece, but it goes too far and it's sort of a lack of originality if you ask me.

Another pretty strange thing I noticed about this movie, one of the scenes where a shark is blown up, they use a sound effect from the 2001 Halo: Combat Evolved video game. It's the plasma grenade sound and I would recognize it anywhere. I've heard movies egregiously rip sound effects from different sources but that was probably one of the strangest ones that I've caught.

Another thing, that big party I was mentioning above? According to the film, there were thousands of people showing up, but they couldn't get enough extras for that and it's obvious that there's only about a hundred or so people.

Possibly less.

Well that's Sand Sharks. Better than both Super Shark and Snow Shark but still a campy flick that's entertainment factor is inversely proportional to your intelligence.