Director: Anthony C. Ferrante
Stars: Ian Ziering, Tara Reid, John Heard, Cassandra Scerbo, Jaason Simmons, Alex Arlo, Vivicia A. Fox, Mark McGrath, Kari Wuhrer, Courtney Baxter, Dante Palminteri, Judd Hirsch
In Sharknado a tornado filled with sharks wreaks havoc on a coastal town. In Sharknado 2: The Second One a triple storm hits New York and the couple from the first movie (Ziering and Reid) are caught up in it again along with some family and old friends.
Yes faithful readers, you read right, today you are getting a bonus TWO movie reviews in one!
Oh boy. Okay. These are rubbish. And I know you may say, ‘Well Man of Yesterday, what did you expect?’ and perhaps that is true. I should have known better and been aware of what I was getting myself into. I put off watching Sharknado for a long time despite the attention it received. Now that the second one is out Syfy showed a double bill, and the sequel got even more attention and highest ever ratings for the channel so as a serious movie reviewer I took it upon myself to watch them and now I wish I hadn’t. Here’s a lesson for you folks, if you feel something deep down in your gut trust it, don’t get swept along with the crowd because it will inevitably lead you to watching a horrendous movie with limp CGI sharks floundering around.
Why didn’t Aesop write a fable about that?
I wasn’t expecting high art or for them to actually be good but I did hope there would be a lot of camp and some tongue-in-cheek humor. I mean, I love a lot of really cheesy films and I don’t consider myself pretentious or a movie snob at all. Yet in these bad films I enjoy I always think there’s a sense of earnestness and sincerity in what the filmmakers were trying to do. Yes, they may have failed completely but at least they tried to inject some heart and tried to create something of substance and this comes through even if it completely misfires.
None of that comes through in either Sharknado movies. The first one is played completely straight and it’s woeful on every level. The second one is far more self-aware but never in a humble way, it’s almost taunting the audience at how dumb they are for spending their time watching this rubbish. There are a few cute references here and there, there’s a quote that references Jaws in the first film and there are a number of celebrity cameos, and I have to admit that a smile did creep across my face when I saw that Judd Hirsch was playing a taxi driver. However, it all seems so smug and it’s not even amusing.
I fail to see why they have managed to squirm their way into public consciousness because even though the premise is ridiculous the movies don’t play up to that. It feels weird writing all this about shark-infested tornado movies but I want to put a warning out there to not watch these movies because they do not fall into the ‘so bad it’s good’ pile, they’re just bad and in no way are they worth all the attention they’ve been getting.