PIRANHA 3-D

My guilty pleasure for 2010 is the silly horror film “Piranha 3-D”, except that I do not feel guilty for liking this film one bit.  This is the kind of film that others think you should feel guilty over, but how can you feel guilty for liking a film like this.  It knows that it is ridiculous, which is its biggest asset, it never takes itself too seriously. 

For the first half of the film it is Spring Break madness, with loads of nudity and partying throughout, but once the horror aspect kicks in, the film gets bloody – very bloody.  This is the only part of the film that is dealt with seriously – the blood and gore.  The Spring Break massacre is one of the most bloody and gruesome scenes you are likely to see and I thought it was just magnificent.  My favourite death was the girl whose hair gets tangled in the motor of a boat, and when someone tries to start the boat to escape in it, the girl is scalped with her whole face coming off with it too – brilliant stuff. 

The only problem I have with the film are the piranha’s themselves (the cgi is crap, I would have preferred silly practical effects like in the original) and the average 3-D.  This was a strange decision, because even though this film was designed as a 3-D film from the beginning, they decided not to shoot in 3-D but to create the effect in post, which always looks terrible.  As much as I enjoyed the film, I must say that I am worried about director Alexandre Aja.  A few years ago after his amazing debut, “Haute Tension” he was claimed to be “the future of horror”, but since then he has been stuck in the U.S making remake after remake, with “The Hills Have Eyes” (good), “Mirrors” (woeful) and now “Piranha 3-D”.  It would be great to see him do something original again, however his next film is a sequel and it is a sequel to this very film and it’s called “Piranha 3-DD” (that’s not a joke).  While I think the title will inevitably be changed, whatever it is called, I look forward to seeing it.

Ranked as Guilty Pleasure for 2010