First, THIS. That’s Elisabeth Shue. She of Cruel Summer soccer montage and viewer of Nicolas Cage’s fatal drink-off. She who knows exactly what the Hollow Man smells like and has seen Milton Moorehead’s true identity. Why is she relevant?
First, THIS:
That’s Piranha. He of “Me and my family masticated an ox to oblivion” and “Me and my family masticated a villager to oblivion” fame. He of “You thought you had a foot but all you have is oblivion, serves you right and good luck wearing sandals now” notoriety.
I’m spent.
Alexandre [High Tension, Mirrors, The Hills Have Eyes] Aja has long been known to be directing a 3-D remake of Joe Dante’s seminal 1978 film, Piranha. So long in fact that I forgot all about it. I mean, surely no one would really want another movie in a series I love that is pretty damn crappie [though the underwater feeding sounds fucked me up as a kid]. Actually I want it, but are people going to flock to schlock?
Yeah, they probably will. For a weekend at least. Everyone will be all about tiny chewing fish coming at ’em. Brackish freshwater tank sales will skyrocket and the black market piranha dealers are going to have to rent space at the mall to accommodate the demand. Then the 70% decline will happen, people will move on to other predators, and discarded pets will grow massive in the sewer and eat transients like stinky babbling Pizzeria Pretzel Combos.
That’s a win/win.
Elisabeth Shue has been brought on (along with the almost famous and quite talented Adam Scott) to challenge the scaled multitudes in the film, proof that she is finally ready to deliver on that Oscar nomination in the mid-90’s. She’s actually a good choice for something like this, a serious actress but willing to have fun [Hamlet 2, Shuelander]. Since Aja’s making the film it’ll probably be dead serious, which means no scenes where our heroine kicks a fish to dry land and chastises it.
Aja’s hit and miss for me. Actually he’s miss and miss for me, because fuck High Tension. Here’s hoping he has fun and lets loose a gory movie with plenty of arterial spray shooting from necks and kneecaps into our eye stalks.
That said, I hope these fish turn out to be clothesatarians, because Mrs. Shue is still quite a looker.