Sharktopus (2010)

Sharktopus (2010) IMDB Link 

Film Producer Roger Corman is a living legend when it comes to B-Movies and creating a litany of weird and wonderful creatures to be featured in his films. Unfortunately his best work is long behind him, leaving him stuck producing terrible by-the-numbers creature features for the SyFy channel. Sharktopus is his latest effort and, despite the admittedly very imaginative creature and title, is yet another huge disappointment that could have been so much more with a better company behind it.

Directed by Declan O’Brien whose biggest claim to fame is having helmed the third entry of the Wrong Turn series, the plot of Sharktopus has been done countless times before. Genetic engineers have managed to create a half shark half octopus hybrid for military purposes that they control using a device strapped to the creatures head. After it hits it’s head on the underneath of a boat, the device is broken leading the creature to roam free and kill every human it comes into contact with. It’s up to a genetic scientist and a bounty hunter to stop the rampaging creature from munching its way through the human populace.

I honestly believe that the SyFy company bigwigs have just one basic script that they use to make all of their films and simply fill in the blanks with whatever creature they have thought up this month. There is nothing new to be seen here and just why they insist on making these creature features as serious films I will never understand. Clearly there is scope to create a ridiculously over the top and fun B-Movie when your creature is a half shark half octopus hybrid but there are no laughs to be found here, not even unintentional ones. The kills are mostly unimaginative and consist of awfully rendered CGI blood splashing around onto rocks and walls. In fact the entire film’s effects are downright awful and look like something made on a commodore 64. Credit has to be given to Corman for coming up with an excellent creature design and something which is actually imaginative but the miniscule budget and the ineptness of the SyFy channels effects team have failed miserably to bring the creature to the screen. In all fairness, even if they had succeeded it still would have been a poor film that is far too similar to every other SyFy channel creature feature.

Roger Corman should just retire; he is way above creating creatures for the SyFy channel that are never going to be handled properly. Sharktopus is a film that could have been great fun of not taken seriously but unfortunately it’s full of terrible CGI, unimaginative kills and very little tension or entertainment. This film marks the beginning of the end for my viewing of SyFy channel creature features.

3/10