Jaws 3-D Movie Review

My God! It's an enormous shark! Coming for you! And it's 3:D! RAAAAR! Um....just scream, dammit!

Jaws 3-D

Viewing Date: 09/03/2005

Summary

Jaws 3:D smacks of D-movie, the kind of film that would have been cutting-edge (pun not intended) at it's time but now feels rather dated and silly. At first, the idea is genius. It's Jaws..... the original idea, a huge goliathon megashark, flying out of nowhere, ambushing Hooper in his cage, trapping teens on a raft, eating up innocent kids way out of their depth; but now, given the chance to really leap out at you, the veiwer, staring the living daylights out of popcorn-munching, text-obsessed teens and cynical adults just seats apart, shot with a cheap, young and recognizable cast, put straight onto DVD and packaged with some stupid-looking 3-D shades, and you might have a hidden rainy-day gem on your hands.

Even the poster screams "Avoid me like the plague!"

However, this is where the plan hits the ocean floor. You see, all the flaws of the first two remain. Silly rubber shark, rubbish teen acting, prolongued set-peices. "But I can tolerate this!" you cry. "For one decent 3-D shark attack!"

How low can this CGI go? Very far, in fact....

And this is where the disappointment really sets in. The 3-D effects are criminally underused, working instead to bring a floating dismembered arm to life, and while Speilberg used the underwater, murky-sea effects to veil his rubbish shark and create tension, the idiot in charge of Jaws 3-D, Joe Alves, has massively missed this clever cinematic trick. What we are left to suffer with is a dire script, played oh-so-poorly by actors who either brood or scream or look like they want to be somewhere else. And when the shark invades the control tower, the horrible cut-and-paste animation will leave you wondering whether this whole film has been a big spoof or not. Avoid like dressing as bacon and swimming off the Amity Beach.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaugh! Styrofoam!