GL84 Invited to a private island, pharmaceutical representatives inspecting a scientists' claims of newfound breakthroughs in genetic research find the trip is a ploy to feed them to a genetically-modified human/shark hybrid and must try to get away alive.This here was quite a decent enough creature feature overall. What tends to really help this one is the fact that the creature here allows this one to ready-made way to work out a natural excuse for the viciousness of the attacks throughout here which is quite fun here. The ability of mixing a shark into a human form is a rather novel idea here and manages to come off nicely with all the scientific jargon established throughout here that makes the revelation of the creature deformity all that much better here as it does come with the added bonus of featuring greater brutality here which enhances the action considerably. From the opening attack on the divers that's incredibly vicious, the group's escape from their holding cell with the pouring water coming in with the creature in with them and the suspenseful stalking in the jungle where they have to deal with the guards and the traps present but also the creature running loose with them gives this a rather strong semblance of action filled with great violent creature action along the way, while the big finale is the film's highlight for its grandiose action inside the lab with the specimens and the creature getting involved as well to a great finish. Even better is the fact that there's other great action scenes here that involve the guards' attempts to contain them, from the boat ambush and eventual gunfight, the brawling around the lab and the helicopter attack in the jungle where they try taking them out with the gun that makes for an overall enjoyable and impressive series of attacks that bumps up the action even more. Along with the great design for the creature that looks quite imposing when it's visibly on-screen and moving around, these here are the film's great points overall. Among the few flaws featured here is the fact that the creature basically disappears in the middle of the movie and almost becomes a complete afterthought as the main part of the film at that point turns into an admittedly fun action movie that pushes the creature out of the film and is hardly ever seen during that point. It's his own movie, yet he's almost reduced to a cameo appearance, based on screen time. As if that also wasn't bad enough, he's hardly ever seen no matter where in the film, as there's only a couple of times that there's a clear shot of the monster, making it hard to tell what it looks like, which is a clear shame as it has a great design and cool look to it. As well, there's the rapid fire editing used every single time it appeared. The camera jerks and tears around from side to side quickly so that you can't see what is going on and can only assume someone has been killed when the water turns red, and as it's used for every single attack, and it lead to a lot of headaches trying to figure it out that only ends up sucking a lot of the fun out of watching the monster attacking people. While the storyline here is a little weak despite the nice work involved, otherwise it's not all that bad.Rated R: Graphic Violence, Language, themes of bestiality and Brief Nudity.

Red-Barracuda Hammerhead is a combination between the mad scientist and killer shark movie genres. In a bit of type-casting, Jeffrey Combs plays the aforementioned mad scientist who develops a human/hammerhead shark creature. Bizarrely, this being is in fact his son, who he has turned into this monster to prevent him dying from cancer. Or something.A group of associates are invited to the scientist's private island. They end up being used as shark bait or shark mate. For some unknown reason the head of IT has been brought along as part of this team. Who knows why? Luckily, he turns out to be a resourceful, if somewhat overweight, Ramboesque hero. I'm working on the assumption that he learnt how to handle an assault rifle as part of his day job working in 1st line support. A normal day for this IT man presumably involves fixing someone's network connection followed by a call to gun down gun-toting evil-doers. Or perhaps a call to fix someone's PC has to be scheduled between physical confrontations with land-based human-shark hybrids? Anyway, he's amazing and saves the day. He even get's the girl.The shark-man is a slightly lame creation but OK, I guess, judging by the effects in general in this film. And the movie moves on at a decent pace. It's complete hokum of course but if you buy a movie called Hammerhead and expect it to be a complex drama about the emotional conflicts experienced by a man turned into a land-based killer fish, then really you have no one to blame but yourself. As it is, there are guns, gore, girls and possibly even an exploding helicopter. It's rubbish but not as bad as some might say.

ghoulieguru Where the hell are all these uncharted islands where prehistoric monsters lurk, evil doctors perform their experiments, madmen hold the ultimate karate championship, and the uber-rich hunt humans for sport? I had no idea there were still so many uncharted islands out there, but if you take into account the number of movies that utilize one of these mysterious islands as a location, you'd have to assume that there are at least 50 of these suckers out there. It always winds up feeling so damned convenient and I immediately deduct points from any movie that uses this hackneyed device. Hammerhead is the story of a mad scientist who is conducting experiments on one of these uncharted islands, so the movie already had a lot to make up for before it even began.The island in this movie used to belong to Dr. Moreau, but has recently been purchased by the Re-Animator himself, Jeffrey Combs. Old Jeffrey is doing some kind of cutting edge stem cell research, which has led him to start working with sharks while searching for a cure for cancer. If that sounds familiar, that's because this is roughly the same basic set-up as the smart shark facility in Deep Blue Sea, not to mention a host of other Nu Image movies. So apparently, Jeffrey's son was dying of cancer which prompted our mad doctor to start experimenting on his progeny. He did some kind of super fancy gene splicing and so forth, turning his son into a shark-man.William Forsythe leads a crew of unknown actors to the island to look into the doctor's experiments. If someone would have given him a sailor's hat, William would have been a dead ringer for the Skipper from Gilligan's Island. In typical Bond Villain fashion, the doctor decides that all of these intruders would make nice chum for his son. Not chums, like buddies... chum, like shark food. So enter shark-boy who starts stalking the Skipper and his cohorts all over the island. They, of course, make half-hearted attempts to escape and are thwarted over and over again while being chased by a guy in a rubber shark-man suit. The movie didn't make up any of the points that it lost for taking place on one of those dastardly deserted islands. It's funny that this movie is called Hammerhead, it made me think of an old joke. Why do you hit yourself in the head with a hammer? Because it feels so good when you stop. That's pretty much how this movie is. The only reason to watch it is because it feels so good when it's over.

ainsleytrout This is a sad movie about this woman who thought her ex who she loved so much was probably dead, but really his scientist dad had just put a spell on him to turn him into this really cute shark-guy. Kind of like in Beauty and the Beast. It could probably use a ballroom dance scene and maybe some singing candlesticks, but there are some pretty gross plants instead. They make this one girl really itchy, so she lets herself get eaten by the shark-guy instead of scratching through the whole movie. The scientist guy is a good dad who tries to reunite his fishy shark son with the woman he was engaged to, he even arranges for them to have private time for s-e-x, but the woman in this is a really shallow snob and thinks the shark-guy is an ugly, icky monster and wants nothing to do with him. She gave up on love! Just because he was a shark! I thought it was pretty sad how all she had to do was kiss him and he'd turn back to normal and they'd live happily ever after, but it's not that kind of movie.