Of course this was already done, i would say i’m surprised it took so long for the obvious idea to actually materialize, but then again it came out in the mid 2010s, an all time high for cheap ass shark movies unafraid to lower the bar even further, this time with the brilliant “ “what if but zombies?” concept, but – again – we never had this specific flavor of shark movie, so whatever.
As even a blind rock could guess by now, it’s a TV movie for SyFy (retitled as Shark Island in some releases), and it’s from director Misty Talley, actually her first shark attack flick, before Ozarks Sharks/ Summer Shark Attack and Mississippi River Sharks (both previously featured here), but also starring Jason London, whom i guess he’s “shark movie borgeusy” since he also shows up in Dam Sharks, for one.
So we have all the ingredients for a mildly fun timewaster… and the result it’s exactly that.
I could end the review here, but lets talk about the plot, despite there being no real need to, since Zombie Shark it’s exactly what it says on the tin and what you’d think it would be.
The plot sees four friends that work at a local back-water (not quite bayou but we’re close) diner-restoraunt go on a boat trip to relax in a small resort-esque place, but they are soon confronted by an escaped experimental shark that infects people and other sharks by basically creating zombies.
With the help of the local resort manager and a special unit soldier (Jason London) enlisted by the resident scientist of the laboratory (situated in a thought to be deserted house close to the resort) staff, they will have to face the zombie menace before it spreads further outside…
To pad things out to 85 minutes we have the expected boring ass romance subplot, not very interesting (although not outlandish per se) explanations of how and why there was a lab there, why and what they were experimenting on sharks, a brief “bar fight”, and the comedic black resort manager rallying up the local backwater gun havers to face the zombie shark horde by the beaches.
So, yeah, while it’s not an outright farce in terms of tone, the movie takes itself seriously… but not too seriously to make it distracting, and there are some funny bits like the attempted kill with a machete, a disembodied zombie shark head somehow moving around by itself, or an airborne zombie shark “headchomping” a human zombie. Yeah, there’s those too, might as well since we’re stuffing the blender with both genres, and at least they had the budget to make the shark carcass a practical effect…. until it has to move, turning into the expected low budget CG creature.
And i have to mention how the final rips off Sharkenado, which came out 2 years prior and i’m sick (more than you probably are) of referencing yet again,, but i can’t avoid it here since it’s so shameless, just with a knife and not a chainsaw, and with a little zombie twist to it, but still…
If nothing else, Zombie Shark reinforces Misty Talley as one of the surprisingly… more competent directors in terms of low budgets TV shark movies for Sy Fy. It’s not as fun as Ozark Sharks, but it’s also better than Mississipi River Sharks, and overall Zombie Shark makes for entertaining enough TV-tier shark crapfest, almost decent trash but not quite due to how it loses steam midway through and lacks the proper energy it needs to be more fun.
It’s that kind of cheesy b-movie garbage you expect from SyFy originals, but honestly the acting it’s actually passable, the characters not grating, the plot it’s stupid but makes some internal sense, and all-around its fairly alright – even if it’s very uninspired nor that that funny – shark shlock.
Actually, it’s a lot like Virus Shark (minus the zombie angle), but a lot better, with an actual budget, lacks the enormous bad taste of exploiting a current global pandemic while it was going on, or the random ass mutant apocalypse plot “turn” (“twist” it’s a big word) in the third act.
Wise Cafe (International) 