PIRANHA 3D-Post Release Thread - Page 6

• You know the movie knows what it's doing when the first thing someone says to Kelly Brook is "Nice boobs."
  
  
• Talent/charisma does not run in the McQueen family genes. Wanted Jake to bite it, bad. Sure, the character is written lame, but the dude should have added something to it.
  
  
• It's an interesting mixture of surprise, joy, and shame, recognizing the various porn stars amidst the proceedings.
  
  
• Brook and Steele can hold their breath for a really, really long time. And god bless 'em for it.
  
  
• Best moment in the film for me was the chick being carried to shore who gets pulled apart. She gives this amazing "What the fuck!?" look/gesture.
  
  
• Loved Jake desperately trying to find/yelling for his lady friend on the tiny boat. In which she's directly in front of him.
  
  
• Adam Scott is hilariously deadpan/flat when they're trying to rescue the kids. Shue: "How do we get past the rocks?" Scott: "I 'unno."
  
  
• That little boy should have died. I really thought that was the only reason for his existence. The little sister was enough on her own for the "we have to go after my sibling" stuff. Boy should have just been fodder. Girl gets to live due to the awesome defining trait of "aspiring trombone rock star."
  
  
• Seriously, sacrifice that kid so Kelly Brook could live!

I caught the movie on DVD and just didn't like it. Didn't hate it but it was basically a really amusing underwater lesbian romp and a failry-cool CGI spring break piranha attack packaged in a movie I just couldn't care about. It felt exactly like Friday the 13th remake all over again. Blood, boobs, winks at the camera, characters who are tremendous douches for long periods of time so the audience will cheer when they finally get theirs. They even both have the somewhat kind-hearted female who gets taken out in the last act.

A lot of reviews I read were very appreciative of the tone of the film and how well Aja and his cast nailed it but I didn't recognize that at all. It was an underwater Final Destination movie with a better cast and equally-unimpressive CG-looking mayhem. This didn't feel like "the return to the 70's and 80's horror films we love" pitch we got from the promotion. I was hoping for something along the lines of Dante's original in terms of tone. Even better examples might be Return Of The Living Dead or Chuck Russell's The Blob remake. Those films are very wild and over-the-top but they created a universe where I actually gave a shit about the characters while still being both fun and occasionally scary. This new Piranha never does that for me. There's some pretty interesting visual stuff going on but there's no emotional depth to the material at all. Yes, there's lots of gore and eye candy but it all plays like the cinematic equivalent of an "Applause" sign at a sitcom taping. I love a fun piece of crap just as much as the next movie-goer but there has to be something compelling to hook me in. I grew up on creature features so this should have been an easy pass in my book but sadly, all I see is missed opportunities. Even with minimal screen time, the right script really could have gotten a lot more out of Christopher Lloyd's character.


 

Thank Christ, it was lonely being the only person (or one of the very few) on CHUD that strongly disliked this film.

I didn't strongly dislike it. I didn't strongly like it either. To me it was a big missed opportunity; happy that they made the attempt, but it didn't stick the landing. Not even close. Its delirious reception around these parts suggests there's a serious lack of quality films, even quality trash. So when something comes out that has its mouth wide open for exploitation fans' dicks, like this or Grindhouse, many react as though they're getting a first-class hummer when they're just getting it sporadically licked with a condom on.

You say that Piranha 3D has fatal script problems and people laugh at you, as if exploitation or horror = shitty script. No, sir. If nothing else this flick made me miss Roger Corman more than ever. He started the original Piranha with what by all accounts was a shitty Jaws rip-off script. He handed it off to John Sayles for a rewrite. He hired Joe Dante to direct it. He said "Here's the money, give me something I can sell to the drive-ins, otherwise do what you want." The result fucking clowns Piranha 3D so, so hard.

First came the word, gentlemen. Sayles may have been jerking off those Corman scripts to pay the rent while trying to break through as a novelist, but he understood story structure and character. Piranha 3D, as I've said elsewhere in this thread, was written by the same clown shoes who wrote the Sorority Row remake.

I couldn't disagree with a single one of your points.  But I can't deny how much fun I had with the movie.  It's not something I'd be itching to revisit though.  

There's some serious rose tinted glasses wearing in this thread, with regards to some old horror films. I still prefer the original Piranha to this but you're acting as if Corman deliberately assembled some sort of dream team for it. Let me give you a hint. He didn't. They were both absolute nobodies when Piranha got made. Therefore cheap. Therefore Corman hired them. Gremlins and Lone Star don't rectroactively provide Piranha with pedigree.

To me, it isn't that Corman actively sought to produce a movie of quality.  That's actually kind of beside the point.  But he was trying to latch onto something hugely successful that was actually very good (JAWS).  And since the big boys were focusing on story and character, these cheap movies tried to incorporate those as well.  Badly perhaps, but at least they made an attempt within their means.

Now, since shitty genre storytelling is accepted as the norm and these horror movies trying to homage the "spirit" in which the original was made, there is just a general dip in "quality" whether it's in a qualitative sense or in a purely subjective sense.  These movies don't really even have to half-ass an attempt at a narrative anymore.  With the fantastic gore fx work and boobs to distract audiences (they certainly distracted me!), why should they bother? 

So much cynicism.  I think I can somewhat empathize with Martin's sentiments.  But as I said, I enjoyed this movie too much.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that Corman cared about the movie being done on time and on budget. And his caring actually ended there. And it's this freedom that gave the chance for a happy accident to happen once in a while.

Quote:

Originally Posted by stelios 

There's some serious rose tinted glasses wearing in this thread, with regards to some old horror films. I still prefer the original Piranha to this but you're acting as if Corman deliberately assembled some sort of dream team for it. Let me give you a hint. He didn't. They were both absolute nobodies when Piranha got made. Therefore cheap. Therefore Corman hired them. Gremlins and Lone Star don't rectroactively provide Piranha with pedigree.

No, but Corman could certainly spot talent. Not every film he produced bore the nascent talent of a future Scorsese or Coppola; not even Piranha. But it's not too far off to say that he recognized that Dante was a passionate film geek/filmmaker (he wasn't a nobody; at that point he had co-directed Hollywood Boulevard and worked on a ton of Corman films/trailers) and that Sayles was a good writer (he wasn't a nobody; at that point he had published two novels). But my point isn't that Corman "assembled some sort of dream team." It's that he picked filmmakers who knew how to tell a fucking story — I don't recall anyone saying about Piranha "Gee, it seems like there should be a third act here," as even Piranha 3D's fans have said — and whoever produced Piranha 3D didn't.

Quote:

Originally Posted by stelios 

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that Corman cared about the movie being done on time and on budget. And his caring actually ended there. And it's this freedom that gave the chance for a happy accident to happen once in a while.

You're definitely part right, but I believe Corman genuinely cared about some of his productions and filmmakers. His cheapo rip-offs are almost always better than the rest, and he introduced a lot of good Italian horror to America. And all his now famous hirees really love the guy. And he also directed some beautiful movies himself.

Bringing this back to the remake, nobody's going to tell me Aja "doesn't care" about his movies. I'm all for blaming the producers on a missing third act, but Corman is merely the obvious comparison point here for vintage schlock, definitely not the only one.

While this was admittedly pretty dumb, and it just sort of.. ends, I have to say that I enjoyed the heck out of it. It was mean spirited, funny, and when time came Aja more than delivered on the gore. It also managed to surprise me in that Jerry O'Connell managed to be funnier than Christopher Loyd. Didn't see that one coming

While I am generally annoyed that it was being touted as a 3D film, given the fact it's actually a 2D movie, this was still one of the more enjoyable movies I've rented in the past few months. I'll call it a success, and state my eagerness for whatever Aja tackles next (fingers crossed: Mirrors 3)

PS I'd somehow managed to forget about the Dreyfus cameo, so that it actually took me by surprise when I saw it. It gave me some minor but genuine LOLs

"They took my penis!" is the line of the decade. Not "ate" or "bit off", but "took". Conjurs up conspiritorial abduction. You'd almost expect to see a ransom note.

This flick is perfect junk food. I hooted and hollered... all by myself in the living room.

Kelly Brook is a dream. I'm already fancasting her in unannounced remakes. Starcrash. Lifeforce. I was honestly sad when she was eaten. Not gleeful like the other deaths. My glee for her was directed at that underwater scene. Pure cinema that.

Bring on the sequel!!!

Wet... T-shirt...

wet... t-shirt...

I was also sad when Kelly Brook died.

I was also a sad panda when Kelly Brook died in Piranha 3D.  

Not quite as strong on the second outing. The special fx are pretty bad on the small screen, although the makeup is still incredible.

Not much in the way of characters, but they actors are obviously having a good time. What bothered me about the movie was the lack of geography or ticking clock when it came to the piranhas. We see where they escape, but unlike the original when it was clear they were moving down river towards the ocean there's no indication of where they are heading here. Everywhere, apparently, which should create a sense of dread but instead leads to several false scares. There are no rules or goals established, and no impending doom until Jerry O'Connell's boat starts sinking. That's handled well, but otherwise we see a lot of random people dying that wouldn't be dying if they stepped out of the water. The original's threat of them reaching the ocean and spreading had much more tension.

Still, boobs and Lloyd, I can't totally fault that.

Piranha 3D 1.5-Post release: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/26/piranhas-attack-100-beach-goers_n_981410.html 

Tried giving this another spin the other night. It still just plain doesn't work. It's just far too obvious in every way for me. It's like "Here's some blood. And some boobs. And a bunch of funny lines we think are witty."