Thursday, September 26, 2024

LET’S GET PHYSICAL: SHE GODS OF SHARK REEF (1958) **

FORMAT:  DVD (REWATCH)

ORIGINAL REVIEW:

(As posted on August 18th, 2007)

Roger Corman directed this island adventure movie in color! The plot has two fugitive brothers Chris (Bill Cord) and Lee (Don Durant) escaping justice by stealing a boat and heading out to the open sea. There’s a bad storm and they end up shipwrecked on an island that’s populated by nothing but beautiful women. The native girls dance around a lot and worship the plethora of sharks that inhabit the sea surrounding the island. Chris falls in love with one of the maidens who happens to get picked to be the next sacrifice to the sharks. When Chris saves her from getting turned into Shark Chow, he upsets the gods as well as the mean old biddy that runs the tribe. Lee and Chris escape the island with his gal in tow, but Lee gets greedy and steals the women’s satchel of precious pearls and is promptly eaten by a shark.

The way Corman tries to match the action to the stock footage in the final scene is pretty hilarious. While most of the movie is stagnant, it actually features some decent underwater photography and makes great use of the gorgeous tropical locations, despite the visible boom mikes. Corman filmed this (in Hawaii) at the same time with Naked Paradise and it played on a double bill with Corman’s Night of the Blood Beast. There’s also a woefully bad theme song, “Nearer My Love to You” that’s good for some laughs too.

AKA: Shark Reef.

No comments:

Post a Comment