doctorbiobrain2005

For as much as my wife and I enjoyed this film (and yes, we did enjoy it), it was almost entirely due to the shark. I mean, I normally don't even watch this sort of thing, but the title alone pulled me in. "Sharks in Venice" I sez to myself, that's GOT to be good. And sure, I was entertained. But...why wasn't there more shark?

I was expecting like Jaws in Venice or something. But this was more like Indiana Jones in Venice (with Shark), and that's just not good enough. Hell, you could have cut the shark out completely and little would have been lost storywise. I mean, why the Mafia stuff? Jaws didn't need Mafia guys. Chief Brody didn't need to rescue his kidnapped wife. It's such a simple formula: Shark in water. Shark killing people in water. Need to get shark out of water. Let's go get that shark. Shark dead. That seems pretty straight forward to me and they even had a nice backdrop of Venice to work with. How can you screw up a formula like that? I'll tell you how, rip-off the third Indiana Jones movie and muck it up with mobsters, that's how. It's like they weren't even trying.

And the weirdest part is that there wasn't even a good reason the shark was in the movie. And you know what? I think the shark could tell. You could feel it in his lackluster performance. He knew he wasn't really the star of this movie, despite the title. He realized they had just taken some other movie idea and thrown shark in it to make it interesting. But that's the thing, the shark was the best part of the movie. So why not make it a shark movie? And again, I'm sure the shark was asking himself that in the few scenes he had, which would explain why he just didn't seem to be giving it his all. Was he better than Baldwin or Johannson? Well, duh! But that's not saying much, is it? Even a DEAD shark would have out-performed the girlfriend.

So was it a good movie? Well, I laughed a lot, so that's something. And the "plot" was just threadbare enough for you to really notice all the glaring holes in it, so that's always fun. But really, the one thing really lacking in Shark in Venice was the shark. And that's a shame. Perhaps some day a savvy filmmaker will put good use to having sharks in the canals of Venice. But until then, you're stuck with this one instead. I wonder if the Snakes on a Plane guys are busy...

I just saw the premiere of the movie and it's pretty damn awesome. I totally recommend it. It's a tight movie that gives you enough of what you need without wasting any of your time. Great acting. Top-notch film-making. If you're disappointed, it's your own damn fault because the movie is solid. Two thumbs up. And if you can watch it with a girl that screams a lot, all the better. It really adds to the excitement, and there's plenty of excitement.

I could tell you more, but you'd wished I hadn't. See the movie. Oh, and if you can see it in a theater that serves good beer, you really should. There's nothing like looking at all that mist while sipping on a nice cold beer.

P.S. Don't go into the mist.

I'm sorry, but I must respectfully disagree with Mr. Sam H. Franklin's review of this movie. There is, in fact, one laugh in the entire movie. It's the scene where Al (played by the always great Alex Rocco) is telling the wimpy Russel (Rob Reiner) how all the merchandise in the store is outdated. And he throws the clothes off the mannequins, and the last mannequin turns out to be an old lady. That was the one funny scene in the movie. The old lady ended up partially naked later on in the movie, but it wasn't nearly as funny. Oh, and Sid Caesar did a couple of things which may be construed as humor, though that is certainly a subjective construct. Other than that, this is a truly horrid movie. I thought it would at least have kitschy value, which it almost does; but it's not worth it anyway. Rob Reiner should have directed.