Ghost Shark has to be seen to be disbelieved

Conceptually, this may be one of the best bad shark movies ever. I mean, it’s still terrible, but what an idea! With tongue firmly in see-through cheek, this is one of the funniest and most fun bad shark movies ever made.

When rednecks on a dynamite fishing trip kill a great white shark, its body drifts into a magical cave where its spectre is brought back into the land of the living to seek revenge. Teenage Ava (Mackenzie Rosman), her sister Cicely (Sloane Coe) and friend Blaise (Dave Davis) are there to see the ghost shark’s first kills but nobody will believe them. They quickly discover that wherever there is water, the shark can manifest and claim another victim and they’ll need to uncover the dark secrets of the town’s past if they have any hope of defeating the monster.

The fact the shark is a ghost in this kooky, spooky offering turns one of bad shark movies’ greatest weaknesses into a strength. Freed of the need to make the shark look realistic and three-dimensional. Instead there’s a translucent shark-like monster and the wonderful conceit that it only needs a drop of water to manifest offers a myriad of opportunities for creative and witty kills which the production doesn’t squander. Plumbers, kids on a slip-n-slide, and a bikini car wash all come a cropper as the shark chomps its way through the seaside town’s residents. Even drinking a glass of water puts you in mortal peril.

There are shades of “It” and even a homage to “A Nightmare On Elm Street” as the film treads a fine line between campy horror and Scooby-Doo pastiche. The writing is terrible, but the performances are enthusiastic enough to put this firmly in the ‘so bad it’s good’ camp. “Ghost Shark” is exactly where the “Jaws” franchise would have ended up if it had carried on the trajectory of “Jaws: The Revenge” and in its ‘personal vendetta’ and now I’m kind of sad that it didn’t – the idea of Michael Caine as the grizzled lighthouse keeper who helps the kids unravel the mystery of ghost shark cove is almost too good to resist. One of the few #SharkWeak2 films that’s actually worth watching – at least once.