Loosely aping the plot like of Jaws Hot Spring Shark Attack lampoons the entire idea of the shark horror genre that Jaws inspired. While we have still gotten good shark movies over the years like Deep Blue Sea, 47 Meters Down and The Shallows to name a few an entire cottage industry has arisen from making a mockery of this genre. Consider films like Snow Shark, Two Headed Shark Attack, Sharktopus and the king of them all Sharknado and it is no wonder that Japan has come out swinging for the fences.
In a move that basically tells Sharknado to “hold my beer”, Hot Springs Shark Attack does use some real life shark attributes to explain its utter lunacy, but none of that matters at all. As the movie ramps up the suspension of disbelief is jettisoned for the type of absurdity that Japan can muster when its feeling frisky.
Our main cast includes the police chief, the mayor, the scientist and the Bath Guard who is adept at battling sharks. So basically Chief Brody, Amity’s Mayer, Dr Hooper, and shark hunter Quint. Their roles both follow and divert from Jaws as this is not a one for one parody with the mayor who wants to keep the hot springs open for tourism, despite sharks finding their way into these springs for victims, getting to go from a sniveling cad to an actual hero by the film’s climax.
There are plenty of tropes from other sources mixed in as we go along. The police chief is on the edge of retirement and is clearly getting too old for this shit, several anime and manga inspired moments abound, prehistoric creatures being awoken by the careless works of man and even some kaiju action by the end. What’s not to love?
The film is what you might call Lo-Fi as in Low Budget Fiction but there is still a lot to appreciate here if you have an open mind. There’s a ton of purposely bad cgi, again I think this is a nod to films like Sharknado but also a lot of puppetry and miniature work that takes me back to the days when Toho reigned as the king of creature cinema in the land of the rising sun. Its really quite charming, so much so that by the time sharks are just swimming through the streets with no good reason you are just like, screw it, at this point I’m all in.
Ultimately Hot Spring Shark Attack is an extremely goofy film that does not take itself seriously and yet the actors never phone it in, getting into the absurdity of the roles in this situation. I can imagine this set had a lot of laughs going on as the film was being made and everyone was just having a good time. If you want some dumb fun this is the movie for you. Turn off your brain and keep an eye out for the many Jaws references. It could make for a fun drinking game.
SCORE:
3.5 out of 5
The horror comedy marks the feature directorial debut of writer/director Morihito Inoue. The cast includes Takuya Fujimura (One Cut of the Dead), Daniel Aguilar (Shin Godzilla), Shôichirô Akaboshi, Masaki Naito, Koichi Makigami, Kiyobumi Kaneko, and Mio Takaki.
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