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Post by wmcclain on Apr 26, 2021 12:12:13 GMT
Piranha II: The Spawning (1981), directed by James Cameron. What's worse than mutant piranha fish? Flying mutant piranha fish! I saw this on video tape and thought it might hold up as good cheesy R-rated fun, something like Humanoids from the Deep (1980). It falls short of that. The action scenes are solidly in the cheap effects creature feature genre, but the human interest main story pasting it all together is painfully bad, with weak attempts at comedy. This obviously owes a lot to Jaws (1975) and the original Piranha (1978). At the time I saw every new horror film through Alien (1979) lenses and I remember thinking "A flying fish erupting from a corpse is just like the chest-burster, isn't it?" The good aspects: - I recollect Tricia O'Neil as easy on the eyes, but also that they were trying to suggest some other actress: maybe Jacqueline Bisset or Rachel Ward? Adrienne Barbeau?
- Lance Henriksen fan club!
- The water does not have that crystal clarity we like for really stunning underwater shots, but there are some lovely scenes and exciting, difficult stunt work.
- A generous amount of boobage and assorted T&A by lovely women. The opening scene is of ambitious underwater sex. Which doesn't turn out well, given the presence of mutant piranha. That'll teach the kids to try fancy fornicating.
Cameron cites Terminator (1984) as his first film, reluctant to take credit for this one. He certainly didn't have much control over the project and it was a rocky production; see the details in the wikipedia article. Which has many "citation needed" notes, so who knows the complete story? Available on Blu-ray from Shout Factory.
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Post by politicidal on Apr 26, 2021 13:34:26 GMT
Everybody's gotta start somewhere I suppose.
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Post by Prime etc. on Apr 26, 2021 17:03:11 GMT
I have only seen it once--I guess it was so bad I never felt interested in revisiting it.
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Post by forca84 on Apr 28, 2021 17:00:04 GMT
As ludicrous as the movie is I have a soft spot for it. For me it all works. It's part of my "Piranha" movie collection. (Well minus the 1995 made for TV version.) Just watched all of the movies again.
Speaking of the 1995 version... It's not too bad. Bit of a segue to the 2010 version... They were heading that way with added blood and nudity.
A few years ago a "Piranha" movie set in Japan was supposed to film produced by Corman. But I guess it's been scrapped or in development hell...
"Piranha DD" is the weak point. The first hour is okay if more goofy. But the finale is rushed and very anticlimactic... Stuck in a Wave pool?? As the Hoff said "If these idiots would just get out of the Water it's not as if the Fish will go home with them." Big difference from being stuck in a huge Lake. And the impending doom and threats. Plus where's the rest of the movie? It's barely 69 minutes. What happened behind the scenes?
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Post by Anonymous Andy on May 4, 2021 12:58:47 GMT
This was bad, but not as bad as Piranha 3DD. That movie made me actively angry.
I might have to revisit this one and see if my opinion of it has improved. I mostly just remember being bored.
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Post by Lebowskidoo 🦞 on May 4, 2021 14:22:56 GMT
It's lame, but watchable. If you never knew it, you'd never guess James Cameron was involved in any way. Too bad it sucked because it made sure we'd never get any sequels...until Piranha 3D.
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