HAMMERHEAD

Did you know that sharks never die from disease and that there is no documented case of cancerous cells in these fish? And furthermore, did you know that sharks have a very long life cycle capable of far exceeding one hundred years? Dr. Preston King knows this very well, who, after setting up an experimental research laboratory on Uncharted Island in the western Pacific, conducts a series of genetic experiments in order to combine human DNA with that of sharks so as to be able to combat any disease hitherto incurable. But Dr. King has much loftier intentions: his primary goal is to succeed in creating a new super-race of immortal creatures, half men and half fish, and give life to the second Atlantis. Nothing new is brewing... Yes, this is surely the first thought that will quickly invade the mind of the viewer after watching the film in question. "Sharkman – A New Breed of Predators", in fact, is nothing more than the latest film about animals enraged following genetic manipulations, or rather, the latest film to be classified in the subgenre of the baest movie, a subgenre so overused and exploited that it can no longer arouse the interest of the viewer. But, perhaps aware of the saturation of this microgenre, "Sharkman" decides to establish a more innovative approach to the genre and, instead of bringing to the stage the usual and now squalid shark, it serves up a repulsive creature half man and half fish, more akin to Frankenstein's monster than Spielberg's Shark. But what could have seemed at first an original and winning idea does not take long to lose color, so that the film, in the end, turns out to be the usual beast movie poor in ideas and lacking a real reason to be rightly remembered. The story, which begins with the most classic and citofonato of ways, does not take long to fall into all the most banal clichés of the genre, bringing to the scene characters and situations seen and revisited that know nothing new to offer the viewer: on the one hand we have the usual team of "brainiacs", this time members of a large pharmaceutical chain, among whom stands out the "usual" hero destined to save the beautiful doctor of the moment and the eccentric billionaire tired of financing scientific research; on the other hand, instead, we can find the mad doctor, ready to give his life in order to revolutionize the scientific landscape, constantly supported by the usual hunchbacked assistant. The commonplaces, as you can see, are all there. But what had started as a classic story, with the passage of the minutes, does not take long to bring to the scene a handful of "original" ideas, or rather, presumed original ideas given that in their innovativeness they do nothing but steal here and there from old cults of the past like "The Island of Doctor Monroe" and "The Island of Fish Men". But it is not only the story that leaves you with a dry mouth, because even if we venture into the technical department we can notice that things are certainly not improving. The direction of Michael Oblowitz, as well as the photography, does not take long to show its television nature, proving to be flat and unable to choreograph the best of the abundant (too many?) action scenes that follow one another throughout the duration of the film. As for the cast, however, we can remain partly satisfied because, among a sea of anonymous and television faces, we can notice the face of Jeffrey Combs who, as obsessed with his cult character as Herbert West of "Re-Animator", returns to excellently wear the clothes of the mad doctor interpreting Dr. King; besides Combs we can recognize the face of William Forsythe ("The House of the Devil", "Halloween – the beginning") who very sympathetically plays the hero of the moment (a role that certainly does not suit him) who in tank top and sweaty from the beginning to the end would like to imitate John McClane resulting, however, only a hero more fat and clumsy than normal. Thus, it seems almost a real defeat, as if this "Sharkman" were an infamous product to be avoided like the plague, but in the end it is not quite so. The defects, as exposed, are abundant and certainly exceed in number the few merits that nevertheless exist. In fact, we have to deal with an anonymous television and coarse-grained b-movie, but the b-movie in question is a film nevertheless endowed with a captivating rhythm capable of entertaining the viewer for the entire duration of the film and even of amusing him without too much difficulty. To further tickle the goliardic aspect of the one who is watching the film, there are the good make-up effects used for the realization of the monster (which range from effective old-style rubber costumes to modern but poor CGI effects) and the abundant splatter sequences unusual in a TV film like "Sharkman". In short, it will not certainly be a beautiful film, but thanks to a good rhythm and a lot of underlying naivety capable of recalling some nice b-movies of the 80s, "Sharkman – A New Breed of Predators" in the end turns out to be an honest little movie sufficiently pleasant. Not certainly impenetrable, but if you come across it...