Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus

F

Mega Shark Vs Giant Octopus

Rated R; Directed by Jack Perez; Starring Deborah Gibson, Lorenzo Lamas, Vic Chao, Sean Lawlor
Video Review

As someone who enjoys quality movies, there are times when the desire for quality takes a back seat to a desire for something less intelligent. Face it, watching a serious foreign drama takes effort, but with a cheesy monster movie in the DVD player you can watch people getting chomped on without expending any brain action at all. So, imagine my delight when I saw Mega Shark Vs Giant Octopus on the shelves at my local rental store. Who needs brains when watching something like this? Um…well…it is harder to turn off my brain than I had thought.

Remember those old science fiction movies of yore? The kind where some giant version of a normal creature would show up and create havoc? Mega Shark Vs Giant Octopus fits that mold with some good old Japanese Godzilla-type plot points. After all, Godzilla fought Mothra. A prehistoric shark needs something to battle, so a gargantuan octopus makes perfect sense in a movie like this…as long as you do not think too long and too hard about it.

Government testing of special sonar equipment disrupts Emma McNeil’s underwater outing. Played by Deborah Gibson of teen-music fame, scientist Emma is the spunky, adrenaline junkie who studies sea life. As the government test goes crazy, Emma has a momentary glimpse of a giant shark and a huge octopus frozen in arctic ice. This ice breaks and the mammoth marine animals are let loose. Okay, one must accept this. Why the two were frozen in battle position, much less still alive after all this time, is not up to a viewer to think about – it will only bring on a headache.

Havoc reigns, but Emma, with the help of her old mentor, Lamar Sanders (Sean Lawlor), and an attractive Japanese scientist, Sejii Shimada (Vic Chao), identify that the multiple disasters are caused by the prehistoric animals. Riiiiight. They find it quite logical and easy to believe.

The movie is awkwardly filmed. Even with two supposedly scary critters, no tension is developed at all. The special effects are not that special. Even worse is the acting among all the ho-hum effects. The actors are called upon to deliver dialog, which they do. Unfortunately, they do not manage to deliver it believably or with any expertise. It is mind-numbingly bad.

For a movie that could have been silly good fun, Mega Shark Vs Giant Octopus is a sad example of movie makers coming up with a fun title while failing to arrive at a story to go with it. I don’t know, maybe I should stick with the foreign films. Then again, I did see a DVD called Ninja Cheerleaders on the shelf. It couldn’t be that bad. Could it?