NIGHTMARES

WEDDING DAY GHOST

SHITTY FLICKS: SHARK ATTACK 3: MEGALODON

Shitty Flicks is an ongoing column that celebrates the most hilariously incompetent, amusingly pedestrian, and mind-bogglingly stupid movies ever made by people with a bit of money, some prior porn-directing experience, and no clue whatsoever. It is here you will find unrestrained joy in movies meant to terrify and thrill, but instead poke at your funny bone with their weird, mutant camp-girl penis. 

WARNING: I tend to give away major plot points and twist endings in my reviews because, whatever. Shut up.

If you can believe it, there was once a time when low budget shark movies were made simply because someone said, "You know what the world needs? Another killer shark movie." It wasn't due to stunt casting or a deliciously stupid gimmick (sharks with two heads, sharks with bombs inside them, sharks chasing after "Jersey Shore" knock-offs) that a killer shark movie was made. No, it was during this purer time when the Shark Attack trilogy thrived, and when it reached its peak of utter stupidity with this:

Shark Attack 3: Megalo-Fucking-Don, starring John Fucking Barrowman and directed by David Fucking Worth.

It begins, much like any other killer shark movie, with a bunch of divers looking for something uninteresting and being killed off-screen by some pretty gnarly Shark Week footage. The Bulgarians-Playing-Americans (Bulgmericans?) really don't like this, and they chomp cigars and scream "oh, jeeze, no!" right into our faces.

After this terror, we cut immediately to Big Grins Island, which, based on the music, must be in Mexico (Bulgaria). 

Oh, okay - someone just said "chica" - definitely Mexico. (Bulgaria. Bulxico?)

We meet some young studs who love to grin and smile, make some jokes, and then do some more grinning and smiling. I'm not sure what's so funny or fun, but my mood has already drastically improved.

These men, who are some sort of lifeguards, take time out to randomly say aloud what the other person should already know. This is called "exposition."

In Shark Attack 3: Megalo-Bitchin'-Don, it looks like this:

My thanks to Arbitrary Nonsense for the script grab.

Our men separate so that one may dive and the other may remain in a boat and say more Mexican things. "Asta la vista!" Or, you know, something else.

It's soon established one of these men - the one who speaks the best English - will be our lead. And why not? He's young, handsome, and a no-nonsense type of guy capable of showing off one simple emotion: smile.

And to mix things up:

Main Guy Diver swims along the bottom of the ocean and finds a shark tooth, confirming years of scientific theory: There are sharks in the ocean. Some Jaws rip-off music leads to a fake scare and the scene ends, and I have lost nearly ten years off my life from the white-knuckle tension David Fucking Worth has mastered.

This diver, who doesn't have a name yet, goes home and logs onto his Shark Fan Forum and posts this message (verbatim):

MYSTERY SHARK

Found This Shark's Tooth ,

But Can't Determine Species.

Any Suggestions Anyone?

Then he sits back and anxiously awaits someone else to solve his problems for him.  

Meanwhile, in San Diego (another part of Bulgaria - Bulgiego?), we're introduced to our female marine biologist, who shares a brief conversation with perhaps the most incoherent security guard since someone hung a guard's uniform on a cactus and another person accidentally asked that cactus for directions to the gift shop. She goes into her office and logs onto Shark Fan Forum and sees the MYSTERY SHARK message. Her intrigue is palpable. 

Later we meet even more characters who struggle with English, one of whom looks uncannily like H.P. Lovecraft. They discuss how some of their underwater equipment is getting fucked up by sharks, and after a bit more unintelligible conversation, the nameless diver leaves. 

As we meet a couple fucking in the water, and as their passion is inter-cut with stock footage accidentally showing two different shark species (oops!), I'll take this time to share with you that the best film of this director's filmography is Kickboxer (yes, with Van Damme, and yes, from 24 years ago). 

And we have a name!

The San Diego-ahn (San Di-eh-gan?) marine biologist scours the beaches looking for one Ben Carpenter. "I saw your message on the Internet," she explains. "One time I saw sandwich at the food store," she might as well say. But Ben is tickled pink to see her. Speaking of tickling pink, Shark Attack 3: Megalo-Fucking-Don features perhaps the best improvised line of dialogue of all time. I'll share it with you a little later.

While our characters enjoy some bland conversation, allow me to point out the acting in this film is fucking abysmal. Normally that goes without saying, but I still feel the need to confirm it. If smiling was an emotion, some would call Ben Carpenter emotionally reckless. It's also painfully obvious everyone's dialogue has been ADRed, so it makes the already lifeless performances that much more awkward, as everyone inadvertently sounds like a 1930s hard-boiled detective.

After setting out into the deep blue for some recon, our marine biologist and her two stooge deckhands marvel at the grainy and cropped stock footage happening right next to their vessel.

"Whoa, look at it!" someone shouts, as I expect to hear Discovery Channel's Mike Rowe rattle off a random shark factoid and then make a wry comment.

The shark attacks, bites dumbly at nothing, and leaves behind a tooth. Our marine biologist, whose name I forgot to mention is Cat, confirms it's the same kind of tooth Ben earlier discovered, so she tags the shark with her tagger pole and celebrates with some unconvincing profanity.

Ben goes to tell Cat the shark has eaten another man when he discovers her terrible secret: she is actually a paleontologist. He does this by picking up her business card that says "paleontologist" on it (do paleontologists have business cards?). It seems obvious she had meant to keep this a secret from him, yet she still felt compelled to bring her business cards that say "paleontologist" to Mexico (Bulgaria) AND leave them scattered all over the table.

Ben runs off because he's really sensitive and the two later reconvene at the dock, where they share some awkward sexual tension. He lets her come aboard his boat, so long as she recognize he's in charge.

"At the first sign of trouble, I'm taking it out," Ben tells her as I laugh.

She agrees, they set out on their expedition, and they find the shark pretty quickly, considering the ocean is fucking gigantic.

"Full throttle, now!" demands Captain Ben, his hand hovering inches from his wang, ready to take it out at the first sign of trouble. They film the shark with their huge VHS camera as they see it approaching the shore.

They chase the shark for a bit and Ben shoots at it, but then they lose sight of it because, ya know...it's a shark in the ocean. With horror they realize the shark is going after a group of drunk para-sailors (always a good idea), as the one in the chute bellows "yes, sir!" in her utter joy at defying gravity. She sees the shark and yells a lot, but her drunk boat captains just think that's just her fun-scream. Too bad for them, as one ends up in the water by accident.

"We're not gonna make it!" Cat screams.

"Sheeee-it!" Ben replies.

We then see stock footage of the shark eating giant chunks of pork, which we are to play along with and pretend to think it's a human body. Then the shark bite-grabs the tow line for the parachute and drags the girl beneath the water, where he feasts on her supple feminine body and growls like a tiger as he tears her apart.

Later, Cat is in bad shape, feeling immensely guilty for being unable to save the poor girl. "If only I hadn't lost my grip on the girl's wrist 37 times..." she wonders.  Ben cheers her up by taking her to meet his old man friend, who provides a theory on why the sharks are going crazy: electricity. He tells Cat he is going to "hack" some government files to see what he can discover.

They leave and Ben has an idea. He points to a church and says, "We're gonna need all the help we can get!" The two go inside and light some official God candles, and the choral music suggests everything is going to be just fine.

During this, the old man makes good on his promise to hack some government files. In case you're wondering, his idea of hacking is to look up in the air and wonder aloud, "Okay... what's... your... password?" Somehow, this works, and like every other movie about killer animals, he finds it's actually people to blame!!!!!!!

Our heroes set out to kill the shark... with a shotgun... and as you can assume, it doesn't work all that well. Instead, the shark bursts through the underbelly of the boat and attacks Cat, but luckily Ben is there to beat it with a stick and scream "DIE!" over and over.

Through some very poor luck, or perhaps bad circumstances, this tactic simply does not work. But it does allow Cat to grab the submerged shotgun, bellow "You're extinct, fucker!" at the shark (which is a great white, so, not extinct) and blow its shark brains off.

So all is well, right?

Of course, WRONG. This movie is called Megalodon, after all, and considering we've only seen normal-sized sharks, it was only a matter of time before the big bastard made an appearance.

With more glory than Jesus Christ himself, our filmmakers take footage of a real shark breaching the surface and chomping its jaws, and digitally insert boats or divers inside his mouth, making it appear as if they are being devoured by a gigantic shark.

It doesn't look at all good - especially when they use the same stock footage for different sharks - but my god do I love it.

Ben tells his Lovecraftian-looking boss about the megalodon and shows him a gigantic tooth, but in an effort to try something new, this time the government bureaucrat refuses to do anything about it. Ben says "then I will!" and then for some reason leaves behind the only proof they have.

Ben, Cat, and the old man all meet at the dock to discuss their next course of action. Then, the following exchange takes place:

Cat grins, and they do just that, set to the same Christ-like music we heard earlier, now complementing some glorious, Prism-era, slow-motion, soft-core action. Buttocks are squeezed, neck bones are licked, watches are checked (mine).

The next day, our heroes set off on Mission: Kill the Shark. They have everything they'll need: an arsenal of explosives, a vessel, and their bland white personalities.

Across the water, pretty much all the people we've been conditioned to severely dislike are on the same yacht for some kind of presentation about some pretty cutting-edge technology. Each jerk-off we don't like each has a hand in the presentation; watch as each actor struggles to remember their elongated dialogue, pausing for full stops to allow their brains to catch up.

The shark bumps the yacht and knocks all the rich people's diamonds and cash out of their clothes. Panic immediately ensues, and rich folk begin strapping on life jackets and throwing themselves overboard... right into the waiting jaws of some badly manipulated stock footage. Some of the jerk-offs throw grenades at the shark (which they have on board for some reason), which doesn't work.

Somewhere along the way, this happens:

And then this:

It is transcendent.

After a lot of fumbling around and light swearing, Ben and the old man manage to shoot a missile directly into the shark's big fucking mouth and blow it into Chicken of the Sea.

"Megala-WHO???" Ben jokes at the end, as the blood of the innocent fallen diffuses into the ocean tide around him. He also smiles.

HEY, KNOW WHAT'S A REAL MOVIE?

MASTERPIECE

I've been lying down for hours now. It's 5:35 a.m. and there's not much I can do. You know what the worst part about my situation is? I'm in the same room as my parents. They keep looking at me, and I can't help but look back and try not to cry or scream. Their eyes are focused on me and their mouths are wide open. There's a strong scent of blood and I feel paralyzed with fear. 

Here's the thing: The second I make any hint that I'm not asleep anymore, I'm completely fucked. I will die and there's nobody around to save me. I've been trying to think of a way out, but the only idea I have is to rush for the front door and scream for help, hoping any neighbors hear me. It's risky, but if I stay here, I'll surely die. He's waiting for me to wake up and see his masterpiece. 

You're probably wondering what's going on. I do tend to get ahead of myself sometimes. 

About three hours ago, I heard screaming from the other side of the house. I got up and went to check on the noise before realizing I had to use the restroom. Instead of doing the smart thing and investigating, I used the bathroom first. I could've gotten myself killed right then for my stupid actions. I did my business and took a peek outside the bathroom. There was blood on the carpet. I got very worried and ran back to my room, hiding under the sheets like the pussy I was. I tried to convince myself to go back to sleep - that it was just some really vivid dream or something. 

But I heard my bedroom door open. Like the terrified child I was, I peeked out from under my blankets to see what was going on. I could see something dragging my dead parents into the room. It was not human, I can tell you that. It was hairless, with no eyes or clothing. It walked like a caveman, with its back slouched as it dragged my parents. But this thing was much smarter than any caveman. It was aware of what it was doing. 

It propped my Dad up on the edge of my bed and made him face me. It then sat my mother down in the chair and positioned her towards me as well. It then started rubbing its hands on the walls, staining them with blood, and then drew a circle with the devil's pentagram in it. This thing had made what it would probably call a masterpiece. To finish it off, it scribbled a message into the wall that I could not read in the darkness. 

It then positioned itself under my bed waiting to strike. 

The scariest thing now is my eyes have adjusted to the darkness since then, and I can read the message on the wall. I don't want to look at it, because it's terrifying to think about it. But I feel I need to see, before I'm killed. 

I peek at the creature's masterpiece. 

"I know you're awake."

Source unknown.

REVIEW: STRIPPED

I suppose if it had been a bigger hit, or if someone had thought of it, Stripped would have been marketed as "Project X meets Hostel." Because that's pretty much what we have here: "found footage" of a group of horny frat-boy types hauling ass to Vegas for a weekend of debauchery, but finding themselves victimized and stalked by a group of black market organ traffickers.

It is Graham's 21st birthday, and so it's off to Sin City with his BFFs Luke, Cameron, and Tommy. They like to smoke weed and drink booze. They make an awful lot of jokes, some involving puke and some involving mothers. They call each other "fag" and make fun of Twilight. Because, you know, kids.

Along the way they pick up Capri, who crashes the party to hitch a ride so she can meet up with her boyfriend, Jake, who lives in Vegas. Once that happens, drama ensues when it's revealed she once had some kind of romantic tryst with Luke. But the kids quickly get back to their jokes and the social awkwardness is left behind for the time being. After stopping off at a gas station bathroom, they discover a business card promising "women willing to do anything to make you happy." (That means hookers.)  And we have a catalyst!

"Mind if I fornicate?"

The minute we meet out first character, you can immediately tell he, and all his cohorts, are going to be obnoxious and unlikable. That's a huge problem, especially in this genre. For Stripped, it's genuinely hard to tell if this was a conscious choice to make the eventual bloodletting all the more satisfying, or if the desire to make our kids "realistic" and "fun" didn't really work out that way. They fart, talk about fucking constantly, and make references to having sex with babies. (Seriously.) Either way, I don't care about any of these kids, at all.

Stripped, as a "story," takes entirely too long to get going. Except for the rather cheap and brief cuts of debauchery and torture soon to come (foreshadowing, only far less subtle!), the first 40 minutes is nothing but watching handsome and/or pretty young people hang out, high five, test your patience, and hold beer bottles. It is around the 40-minute mark when the kids finally get to the shady, out-of-the-way place where the strippers/hookers hang out.

Oddly, it is around the 45-minute mark where director J.M.R. Luna abandons the found footage aesthetic altogether and begins to shoot the film traditionally, which is jarring, to say the least. There is an attempt to maintain the style using surveillance cameras (which make no sense existing in an incredibly illegal and murderous operation), but all this does is make the brief, traditionally-shot sequences stick out all the more. Adding to this confusion is they seem to have used the same camera for every shot - the "found footage" amateur stuff as well as the real-movie, traditional stuff. So, take your established inconsistency, add this newer confusion, and you have Stripped: the feature film that dares you to figure out what's happening.

And finally, it is around the 50-minute mark when anything the least bit resembling a horror film finally begins to occur. This in a 75-minute film.

There is absolutely no attempt at coherence in Stripped. Although it's plainly established there is only ever one camera in use for most of the trip, suddenly, when it's essential to the plot, Capri randomly has her own camera. And speaking of, there's absolutely no reason, once Capri attempts to find her friends in a seedy whore house and becomes understandably scared, that she would hold her camera out at arm's length and film her own face as she walks around - especially when it's been established the filmmakers are willing to switch perspective to  traditional shooting, which easily could have been employed here. The most damning aspect to this is that Capri clearly has a camera - speaks directly into it at one point, like a diary - but then when she walks by in a "surveillance camera" shot, is obviously not holding a camera. This doesn't happen just once, but repeatedly.

I mean, what the fuck?

Honestly, there isn't much I can say about Stripped that's positive. The acting is decent, but only because it's not hard to get a bunch of kids to act obnoxious and silly. The girls were pretty and the boys were handsome. Everything shot was in frame and in focus. The strippers showed off their cleavage and sometimes their goods (if you're into that sort of thing). When the kids are killed and harvested (spoiler?), smile in relief, because it means the end is coming. 

I mean...that's it.

Look, if you always wanted to see the guys from "Jackass" get sliced up to rock/rap, all mixed with a lot of nudity, AND a scene where a naked boy fist-fights a crazy surgeon, now's your chance. Normally I'd feel guilty trashing a film this bad, but I don't this time. Maybe because this isn't even really a film. To call it such is an insult to filmmakers actually trying.

FINAL REPORT

Ash, can you hear me? Ash?

Yes, I can hear you.

What was your special order?

You read it.
I thought it was clear.

What was it?

Bring back life form.
Priority One.
All other priorities rescinded.

The damn company.
What about our lives,
you son of a bitch?

I repeat,
all other priorities are rescinded.

How do we kill it Ash?
There's gotta be a way of killing it.
How?
How do we do it?

You can't.

That's bullshit.

You still don't understand
what you're dealing with, do you?
Perfect organism.
Its structural perfection is
matched only by its hostility.

You admire it.

I admire its purity.
A survivor...
unclouded by conscience,
remorse,
or delusions of morality.

I've heard enough of this,
and I'm asking you to pull the plug.

Last word.

What?

I can't lie to you about your chances, but...
you have my sympathies. 

If we don't, remember me.