The Shark Film Office

Blue Demon (2004) Director: Daniel Grodnik  Cinema 4 Rating: 3/9 Species: genetically modified great white sharks "Four years and millions of dollars on this project, and all I've got to show for it is a couple of big sharks with pretty eyes?" - Lawrence Van Allen (Danny Woodburn) Let's imagine that Daniel Grodnik, the director-slash-co-writer-slash-producer, (i.e. The One On Whom To Place All Blame) of the genetically engineered great white shark, straight-to-video purgatory flick, Blue Demon , falls into that much fabled Peter Jackson fan-boy territory. Jackson, much like Ray Harryhausen and Ray Bradbury before him, credits the 1933 King Kong as the chief inspiration for his life and career in the realm of fantasy storytelling. ( Kong , as regular readers of my original blog, The Cinema 4 Pylon , know full well is my favorite film as well, though I have yet to get either a life or a career, in any realm...) Jackson works his way from making small, independ...

A*P*E   (1976) Director: Paul J. Leder TC4P Rating: 2/9 "Imagine. Almost 36 feet tall... wow..."   - Freighter mate on ship transporting A*P*E across the ocean at start of film. You are going to run into this film on just about any "So Bad You've Gotta See It!"-type of site or book... and yeah, it is... and yeah, you gotta see it. Its fecundity is only matched by its stupidity, but in its tattered, zipper-up-the-back way, its actually quite clever. But only if director Paul Leder actually meant the film to be this bad. Could there be a chance that this chintzy, decrepit South Korean production is actually the most brilliant spoof in the history of movies? A film that not only mocks giant ape movies and current movie trends, but does it in the way that most common citizens "think" of or expect giant ape movies to be? Is the entire film a complete put on, and to a large degree, a cynical attempt to flip off the audience (which the big simian does at ...