Escape of Shark

Of course I had never heard about this 2021 Chinese shark movie titled "Escape the Shark" prior to stumbling upon it here in 2023 and opting to sit down to watch it. Of course I had to watch it, with it being a shark-themed Asian movie that I hadn't already seen before.

I have to admit, though, that my expectations to writer and director Hang Zhu wasn't overly big. Usually shark movies are cringeworthy to sit through. But still, giving "Escape the Shark" the benefit of the doubt, I sat down to watch it.

The storyline in "Escape the Shark" is pretty straight forward. And for a shark movie, it was pretty generic, I would say. A couple of tourists are trapped inside a flooded hotel after the resort is struck by a tsunami. But the tsunami not only brought water with it, but also a hungry shark. And that shark that now swim about the hotel, looking for its next meal.

Sure, it was entertaining enough for the cheesy narrative that it was, and it was certainly a fun enough movie to sit through. There are far worse shark movies than "Escape the Shark" out there. It was predictable, of course it was. But still proved to be a fun enough watch.

I wasn't familiar with the cast ensemble in the movie, but they had a fair enough ensemble of actors and actresses to portray the various roles and bring the movie to life on the screen.

The dialogue in the movie was wooden, rigid and rather awkward. I mean, with dialogue such as this: "Honey. I know you're very brave. It's my fault. You are by my side. I'm not scared.", then you're not really in for an evening's worth of Shakespearian theater, now are you?

Visually then I think "Escape the Shark" was actually not all that shabby. The CGI rendered shark was fair enough and definitely better than many other Hollywood attempts at making shark movies. Something I will never grasp about movies such as "Escape the Shark" is the sound effects they opt to add to the shark. I mean, a growling shark is just laughably stupid, especially since sharks have no vocal chords.

"Escape the Shark" makes for an adequate enough movie if you're looking for a movie where you just lean back, munch on the snacks and enjoy the over-the-top cheesy events on the screen.

All in all, then "Escape the Shark" was a fair enough shark movie. Nothing outstanding, nor anything that hasn't been seen or done before. But it was wathcable for what it was.

My rating of writer and director Hang Zhu's 2021 movie "Escape the Shark" lands on a five out of ten stars.