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SHARK KILL (1976) |
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“Judging by the way the shark took your brother’s
leg, I’d say it’s about fifteen feet.” “Fifteen feet!? But – this boat is only eighteen!” |
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Director: William A. Graham Starring: Richard Yniguez, Phillip Clark, Elizabeth Gill, Jennifer Warren, Victor Campos, David Huddleston, Jimmie B. Smith, Carmen Zapata, Richard Foronjy, Roxanna Bonilla-Giannini Screenplay: Sandor Stern
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Synopsis:
Work halts on an
oil rig off the southern
Comments:
It is simply
impossible to overestimate the impact upon the motion picture
industry of the release of
Jaws
during the American summer of 1975. For better or for worse, nothing
about the way that films were conceived, or made, or marketed was
ever the same again; while even now, more than thirty years later,
the specifics of that production are still being regurgitated in
killer animal films almost without number. The financial success of
Jaws made a
slew of cash-ins inevitable; and indeed, we are able to calculate
almost to the minute how long it used to take for a blockbuster
success to spawn its rip-offs.
Jaws
opened in US cinemas on the 20th
June, 1975. The first overt
Jaws
copy was William Girdler’s
Grizzly, which took the
Jaws
formula and reproduced it wholesale in the forests of Although it is hard to imagine that this film would ever have been produced without the triumph of Jaws, it would be unfair to call Shark Kill simply a Jaws rip-off. In fact, it may have less in common with its illustrious predecessor than any other killer shark film made since. There are only a couple of moments when it wanders near to those by-now well-worn tropes. Granted, as soon as the bounty is placed upon the shark, the water is covered by boats full of drunken idiots....but as I said, I think, in my review of Red Water, that’s less a Jaws cliché than a sad recognition of human nature. Besides, those drunken idiots turn out to play a very important part in the film’s climactic sequence. Otherwise, there is reluctance on the part of the divers and oil company employees to believe that the shark that Rick Dayner has seen really is a great white, but it hardly outlives a recitation of Rick’s professional qualifications. As usual, the almighty dollar is at the root of most of the selective blindness.
These days it is hard to decide how much sympathy we’re supposed to
feel for the losses being sustained by the oil company, first
because of the line blockage and then because of the shark, but the
dilemma of the divers – many of them immigrants, and struggling to
make ends meet – is clear enough. The oil company employee
overseeing the diving puts the decision upon the shoulders of the
dive-boss – because he can – while the dive-boss does finally send
his men back into the water – because he must. Tragedy follows.
Suspending their initial hostility, Rick and Cabo join forces and
hire a boat in which to hunt the shark, but the circumstances being
what they are, the only vessel available to them is a dinky little
eighteen-footer – the It can be difficult to find the right balance when dealing with something like Shark Kill, which was, after all, certainly not made in expectation of having to stand up to any kind of critical scrutiny; not even critical scrutiny as haphazard and partial as this. While finding fault with a little film like this is (ahem) rather like shooting fish in a barrel, it is also possible to find a few virtues in it – although a real love for this particular sub-genre probably helps. One thing I can commend Shark Kill for is that it gets its species of shark right. Now, that may sound stupid, but if you’ve watched as many killer shark films as I have, you’ll know how often any old shark is thrown at the viewer, regardless of its identity – and that’s even aside from the scourge of the twenty-first century, the CGI shark, which more often than not is simply appalling. Shark Kill’s shark may be stock footage, but they promise us a great white, and a great white is what we get. For someone like me, content simply to look at these animals, that’s a treat in itself. In addition, this may be the only killer shark film ever made – and in saying that, I include Jaws – that is satisfied to give us a shark of realistic dimensions. At fifteen feet, this shark is bigger than average, but not ridiculously so. At any rate, it’s big enough – particularly, I would have thought, if you’re a six-foot man in an eighteen-foot boat....or adrift in the open ocean.... But of course, if you’ve only got a stock footage shark, then there will only be so much that you can do to make that animal seem threatening. Shark Kill tries its best, via some fairly desperate editing and an even more desperate cranking up of the soundtrack, to convince us that its characters are in danger, but little tension is generated. Then, too, it is evident that only a limited amount of stock footage was available; the film resorts to both repeating and reversing shots in order to pad out its resources. Apart from a few random inserts, there are only three real shark sequences in this film: when it menaces a dive-crew early on, without their being aware of it; when it makes its fatal attack; and when it considerately reappears for the climactic showdown. Even in a film only seventy-six minutes long, that’s not a whole lot of shark. In order to stretch itself out to an acceptable running-time, Shark Kill took the obvious road, and ends up being a perfect example of a very old cinematic truism: action – and stock footage – may be expensive, but talk is awful cheap. The real triumph of Jaws has, of course, very little to do with its shark. Where that film succeeds best is in the sequences between the shark scenes, which are beautifully written and brilliantly executed; so much so, that not only is it easy to overlook how little we really see of the film’s eponymous star, but by the time the shark does make its belated appearance, the commitment of the viewer to the characters is absolute – and so is the suspension of disbelief. Sadly, this lesson seems to have been lost upon the perpetrators of most of the Jaws imitations, who give us neither characters we take an interest an in nor sufficient shark scenes to ease the consequent pain. Shark Kill passes its time away from the water by dwelling on the personal and professional issues of its twin protagonists, and in doing so outdoes a lot of its competition by managing to bat five hundred. As Cabo Mendoza and his on-again, off-again girlfriend, Bonnie, Richard Yniguez and Elizabeth Gill are so likeable that their portion of the film goes down very easily. We see Cabo at work, at home with his extended family, and fist-fighting for fun and profit, generally against those unwise enough to object to the presence of a “Chicano” at their favourite bar. (Bonnie, in the know, earns a tidy profit betting on the former naval boxing champion. “I got a hundred dollars says Cabo can beat that creep!” she announces as Cabo steps outside with his mouthy opponent. “Which one’s Cabo and which one’s the creep?” inquires her intended mark.) None of this is anything we haven’t seen in dozens of other films, but it’s deftly written – by our old friend Sandor Stern – and nicely performed, meaning that as long as we are in company with Cabo and Bonnie, we don’t resent too much the prolonged absence from the screen of the shark we’re really here to see. The same cannot be said, however, of the scenes dealing with Rick Dayner and his girlfriend, not just because Phillip Clark and Jennifer Warren lack the charisma of their co-stars, but because the defining characteristic of both Rick and Carolyn is their monumental selfishness. Hearing that Rick has quit his job, Carolyn’s only thought is that now they’ll be able to spend the weekend together, like she wanted. His frustration at his inability to get his superiors to listen to him prompts nothing more from her than a suggestion that he return to Los Angeles with her – “There’s nothing for you here!” – while when he decides that he must make another effort to warn people about the shark, she backs away from him altogether, as though his request for some emotional support was an outrageous imposition. But Rick himself is hardly Mr Pure. While his walking out on his job over the oil company’s refusal to take the shark threat seriously initially seems admirable, it becomes less and less so the more we learn about Rick. In fact, the man is a serial job-loser who has some serious problems with both authority and responsibility; whose one professed goal in life is, “Freedom, man!”; and whose agitation of the press and the police about the shark has less to do with his concern for the public than it does with justifying his latest professional failure. Be Rick’s motivations what they may, his gloomy predictions are fulfilled when the shark kills one of the oil company’s divers and takes the leg off another – Luis Mendoza, Cabo’s brother. A reporter on the paper that Rick tried to alert phones him to tell him that the oil company has put a $20,000 bounty on the shark, while Cabo gets the news from the paper itself. The two halves of Shark Kill collide when, both in quest of suitable transportation, Rick and Cabo meet at the docks and form an uneasy alliance. Now, the shark has at once killed one of his colleagues and deprived his brother of both his leg and his livelihood, so Cabo’s mingled desire for vengeance and financial gain is understandable; but Rick is another matter. Once the bounty is announced we hear nothing more from him about the public good. He first tries to hire a helicopter from which to shoot the shark, and when he learns that there is none available until the following day, protests, “But the shark might be gone by then!” Uh, Rick? Shark gone, people safe---- Isn’t that good? Evidently not, as Rick immediately hot-foots it to the dock to find a boat in which to pursue the animal – which has, in fact, moved right away from the oil platform. Eventually he reveals to Cabo his intention of using his bounty money to buy a boat, said boat representing, “The freedom to tell everyone to buzz off!” This is, in short, a man whose only ambition is to rid himself of all personal responsibility; who wants money but isn’t willing to work for it. What’s worse, this is a marine biologist who has no thought in his head but to kill an animal for profit. We learn that prior to his walking out on the oil company, Rick has had “three jobs in two years”. If his behaviour here reflects his idea of “marine biology”, it’s hardly surprising.
Armed with the fruits of their various labours
– recordings of injured fish and an underwater sound system on
Rick’s part, and a inflated floating explosive device dubbed a
“Mendoza cocktail” on Cabo’s – the two men set out in the diminutive
Candy Bar. Failing to catch sight
of their quarry, and with a fog settling in, they reluctantly give
up for the day – only to find that the boat won’t start. Becalmed
and hidden by the fog, the men suddenly see another vessel, much
larger and manned by drunken partiers, bearing down on them. Moments
later, the
It is this twist that has seen some belated
comparisons drawn between
Shark
Kill and the recent
Open
Water; and while the horrifying
true story that inspired the latter film is sufficiently well-known,
it’s tempting to think also that Chris Kentis might have seen
Shark
Kill during his formative years.
Unfortunately, the limitations of
Shark
Kill’s resources mean that not much
is made out of what should be a nerve-wracking sequence. Rather,
Rick and Cabo keep themselves going by doing what they do for most
of the rest of the film, too: they
talk
– and
talk – and
talk. (To be fair, this is of
course what two people in such a situation
would
do.) Thankfully, this night is shorter than any other in And the film closes with Rick and Cabo on their new boat. Something curious happens over the final third of this film. Rick Dayner, who for most of the film is pretty obnoxious, displays a new likeability in his interactions with Cabo; but if Cabo succeeds in making Rick a bit less of a jerk, then Rick succeeds in turn in infecting Cabo with his own jerk-itis. We hear no more about Cabo’s brother, or his disability, or his financial woes, which the bounty money was supposed to cure. Nor do we see much more of Bonnie or Carolyn. Cabo, we know from the beginning, is the footloose type, and Bonnie takes his desertion with a rueful shrug. Meanwhile, Rick’s relationship with Carolyn effectively came to an end when she refused to accompany him to the newspaper office – although he does sleep with her one more time before officially walking out. Nice. Shark Kill ends with both men celebrating their ditching of all personal and professional and financial responsibility. Upon reflection – and I’m not sure this is really anything for it to boast about – this film probably features the most peculiar emotional component of any killer shark film except Tintorera....but that, my friends, is a tale for another time.
I hope I haven’t been too hard on
Shark Kill. It does,
granted, represent a fairly tentative beginning to the epoch of
the post-Jaws shark
film, but whatever its limitations, it at least had the grace to
carve itself a tiny original niche, instead of merely
replicating its celebrated forerunner, as it so easily could
have done; as a great many films
did do, and continue
to do. Apart from its historical importance,
Shark Kill is also a
good example of what just might be the last great untapped
resource of archival cinema: the made-for-television movies of
the seventies and eighties. Anyone who grew up in the era of
MFTV film-making cannot help but have a handful of these little
films engraved upon their heart. (Here’s a test: find someone of
the right age, mention
Don’t Be Afraid Of The Dark, and watch them
squirm.) At their
best they were brilliant –
Duel, lest we
forget, was originally made for television – and even those of
modest virtues, like
Shark Kill, have an integrity about them entirely lacking in
the dispiriting product churned out like sausages by today’s
direct-to-DVD companies. |
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----17/09/07 |