SKY SHARKS **** Germany 2020 Dir: Marc Fehse. 110 mins
After being teased of this upcoming Nazi zombie/flying shark combo for what feels like a good couple of years now the wait is finally over! SKY SHARKS has been released into the wild premiering here in the UK as the opening movie of this year’s online Frightfest film festival and let me just say what a great choice to kick things off with. I guess given its reception it was possibly a bit risky but for the most part it was met with a positive reaction as long as you’re not part of the easily offended demographic.
The plot goes along the lines of an experiment conducted by Dr. Klaus Richter (Thomas Morris) who devises a substance that creates a super soldier for the Nazi regime, realising his mistake Richter flees and effectively swaps sides. Injecting himself with this substance seems to prolong his life and he is once again recruited this time by the Americans during the Vietnam War to do further experiments. Skip forward to the present day and Richters first experiment has recently been discovered by geologists. A huge warship called the Himmelsfaust abandoned in the Arctic has resurfaced and inside it’s content of reanimated zombie Nazis and their mechanized mutant flying sharks are on the attack preying on regular passenger planes. Given that Richter now appears to be over one hundred years old he sends his 2 daughters (apparently only in their thirties?!) in to right his wrongs and save the day.
To be totally honest with you if it was just Nazi zombies riding around on flying sharks killing things for no apparent reason for 90 minutes I would’ve been happy, the fact that they went through the trouble of thinking up a plot line no matter how convoluted it is is probably why this took so long to be made! SKY SHARKS is the crazy, wild ride you expect from its title incorporating so much insane gore, cool looking zombies, adorable sharks encased in cute metal suits, hilarious one liners, at least 2 (maybe 3) montage sequences and way more boobs then you may at first expect. Unfortunately the majority of the special effects are obviously done by the use of green screen and a lot of CGI but the zombies and the sharks do look pretty awesome. The gore is delightfully prominent throughout and they really don’t hold back with some impressive evisceration, mid coitus head trauma and a great scene similar to that of the opening sequence in GHOST SHIP. Tony Todd pops up in a small role as an Army Major but unfortunately is under-used and only appears via video link but they at least give him some memorable dialogue ( “it’s raining barbeque fucking catfish!” ). Other cameos include Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa as a lecherous drunken passenger and Lynn Lowry as a nun in a SHARKNADO-esque opening title sequence that ends in catastrophe. The acting is really quite dodgy but it’s not the kind of film you would expect Oscar winning performances from so you can easily overlook this. The soundtrack is energetic and a great combination of 80’s sounding synth tracks. I was over the moon to hear German 80’s thrash metal legends KREATOR feature over the final credits! You also need to watch beyond the end credits as you are then treated to a faux trailer for SKY FROGS a film hinted at during an in-flight movie in the main feature.
Definitely a movie not to be taken seriously but one to savour, enjoy and appreciate as the tremendously fun feature it truly is. I think the majority of the people that chose to watch this as part of the Frightfest online experience really did enjoy it but as always there are the odd few that just don’t get it and find CGI blood and fake boobs offensive then choose to vent their opinions as publicly as possible and trash it when in truth nobody really cares what they think.
Review by Sarah Budd
