SHARK LAKE (2015)

 

Shark Lake (2015)

Summary: Fiercely protective single-mom Meredith Hendricks happens to also be the best cop in her quiet town on Lake Tahoe. When a black-market exotic species dealer named Clint, is paroled from prison, something he let loose begins to make its presence known. Swimmers and land-lovers alike begin to become part of the food chain at an unbelievable rate. Meredith and the new man in her life, a biologist named Peter, begin to investigate these brutal attacks and discover that they're not just hunting one eating machine, but a whole family of them. After a documentary crew is devoured when they don't take the threat seriously, it's up to Meredith, Peter, and the unlikely hero, Clint, to stop the most dangerous thing on the planet: A mother protecting its young. Not everyone will make it out alive, but those who do will never forget this summer at Shark Lake.

 

 

The movie begins with Clint (Dolph Lundgren) leading the police on a car chase before he is arrested. The police chase leads to him crashing his car into the lake and accidentally releasing a bull shark that he was smuggling for a private collector. It than quickly jumps forward to the day he gets paroled. Officer Meredith Hendricks is following every detail of his release because she has adopted his daughter and she does not want her to be involved in her life. At this same time, an old man is killed by the shark. It happened in shallow waters and was originally assumed to be a bear. Another attack occurred the following night when a couple went for a naughty swim. Peter finds proof of the second attack and realizes the culprit is not a bear but a shark. He brings the proof to Meredith and they rush off to the beach to get people out of the water. A para-sailor is attacked when they get there but everyone makes it out of the water alive. A reality TV star shows up to hunt the shark as long as he is allowed to film it for his show. He is not successful but his death did provide footage that there is not one shark but three and they are hunting in a pack. While this is going on, Clint is visited by the collector who bought the shark 5 years prior. That man wants his shark and threatens to hurt Clint's daughter if Clint doesn't go catch the shark. Clint's daughter, who knows who her dad is but doesn't really know him, looks up his address and goes to pay him a visit. She sneaks onto his boat right before he takes off to go hunt the shark. Meredith and Peter who are not out looking for her, follow Clint out onto the lake which leads to a final battle with the sharks.

 

 

Now I wouldn't say this was a bad movie but it is a bit deceiving. Shark Lake spends just as much, if not more, time with the story line regarding Clint's daughter than it does the sharks. In fact, the sharks are probably only in the movie for a total of 20 minutes. Although in those 20 minutes, we did get to see Clint put an Ivan Drago style beating on a bull shark. See what I did there?

The acting was good. Most of the characters were very convincing. My only real complaint about the movie would be the lack of realism in the death scenes. I obviously wasn't expecting top of the line special effects but they still tried doing a bit to much. The prosthetics used for the injuries was very well done. My problem is with the victims that gets pulled under the water. The victim gets pulled under the water and the water instantly turns red in a manner resembling Glenn's death in A Nightmare on Elm St.

 

 

That little tid bit aside, it was a pretty decent movie; definitely watchable. Not something I would rush out to see or buy for that matter however if you're Netflix binging or flipping channels and you see it come across your screen, it wouldn't be a bad idea to check it out.
 

          

reviewed by Bobby