Piranha plumbs the depths

Piranha 3D
Reviewed by Adam Kamien
Rating: ****

WHEN sitting in judgement on the success of a film, it’s important to take into account the aspirations of the filmmakers. Did they hit their mark or fall short striving for something beyond them?

The point is, there’s no use holding Piranha 3D up against My Dinner with Andre.

What should be noted is that within the obvious restraints of exploitation horror, this remake of the 1978 film of the same name (without the 3D suffix) achieves everything it sets out to do and more.

There’s buckets of blood, shrieking teenagers on spring break, nudity, drugs and expeditious exposition that wouldn’t withstand even the most cursory inspection.

This is a high-camp, high-gore and hi-larious gem.

The plot is as follows: Underwater earthquake releases prehistoric mutant piranhas. Said piranhas attack 20,000 very attractive drunk teenagers, culminating in a near 20-minute orgy of flesh-stripping, bone-grinding violence, which take in scantily-clad bodies being cleft in twain, faces getting torn off, 3D vomiting and one of the most execrable parasailing scenes ever committed to film. The particulars are neither here nor there.

There are, however, one or two cracking cameos, including Richard Dreyfuss who plays Matt Hooper, which also happens to be the name of the shark expert he played in Jaws.

There’s Christopher Lloyd (Doc Emmett Brown from Back to the Future) as marine life expert Mr Goodman, and Eli Roth (director of horror films Cabin Fever and Hostel) who plays a misogynistic wet T-shirt master of ceremonies, who, like everyone else in this den of iniquity, gets his comeuppance in spectacular fashion.

Actor Elisabeth Shue, Oscar nominated for her performance in Leaving Las Vegas, plies her trade alongside Playboy bunnies and porn stars in Piranha 3D. Cast in the Chief Brody role, Shue is a good sport, walking through the role with her tongue planted firmly in her cheek.

Jerry O’Connell (Kangaroo Jack, Tomcats) hams it up as a porno director, whose nastiness comes back to bite him where a porno director would least like to be bitten, and Ving Rhames (Pulp Fiction, Mission Impossible) plays the sheriff’s offsider.

Ironically, the message at the heart of this godless, sexually-charged gore-feast, if indeed there is one to be gleaned, is very Christian.

Director Alexandre Aja paints the indulgent revelling co-eds in Piranha 3D as Sodomites and the carnivorous fish as God’s terrible retribution. There is even a vessel among the party boats with placard-wielding missionaries, pleading for people to “repent before it’s too late”. Predictably though they don’t, and their indulgence is brutally, albeit hilariously, punished.

A remake of the Joe Dante directed grind-house hit Piranha, itself a parody of Jaws, horror whiz kid Aja applies Pete Goldfinger and Josh Stolberg’s pitch-perfect script with maniacal glee.

This is an adoring homage to the glory of bygone horror abandon. A time when films could embraced their B roots by stripping back exposition, sentiment and backstory and giving audiences what they want: sea, sex and blood (which also happens to be the tagline for Piranha 3D).

Piranha 3D is currently screening nationally.

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