Piranha 3DD

This review was nearly never written. Not because my laptop imploded or because I was attacked by mentally-deranged monkeys on my way home from the cinema. No, I nearly skipped writing a review of Piranha 3DD because it's hardly worth the effort. In fact, this film doesn't deserve to be discussed because, quite frankly, it's one of the worst films I have ever seen (I wouldn't say that lightly) and I'm slightly hesitant to waste anymore energy on it by typing this. However, I feel I have a duty: to warn you and perhaps beg you, to not see this film.

Any film which has the tag line “Double the action. Double the terror. Double the D's” was never going to win me over and, after seeing the trailer in which David Hasselhoff exclaims he's not a real lifeguard and bikini-clad women run around being bitten by demonic fish, I was rather dreading my trip to my local multiplex to see John Gulager's sequel to Piranha 3D. Piranha 3DD (see what they did there!) follows a similar plot to that of its predecessor – i.e. fantastically-aggressive fish terrorising all who dare to enter the water but this time, it's set in a water park. Simple set-up, simple plot. The first thing to be said about this monstrosity of a film is that the story is so weak and so all over the place, that the term 'plot' seems to be totally unsuitable. Character development was non-existent, the story was about as uneven as a Lego mattress and events seem to be purely geared towards splattering as much blood and guts at the audience as possible. But then again, what was I expecting?! There was, of course, no need for the film to be in 3D (apart from allowing the writers a cheap joke in the title) and did nothing to lift the one-dimensional characters and wooden acting.

Away from the technical aspects, the level of gore and fishy violence was rather stomach-turning, culminating in a child's head being bitten off by a piranha (hilarious, I know). Everything about this film was offensive and crass: women swimming around with no clothes on would be the least of a feminist's worries. An appearance by David Hasselhoff was laughable and rather desperate and made the whole proceedings seem like a bad dream. Marketed as a horror-comedy, I can assure you I was neither scared, nor amused and I'm sure there are college courses in public convenience cleaning which are more entertaining than the 83 minutes of boring drivel which I had to endure.

Poor production values (the continuity person should have been fed to the piranhas) and a philosophy that if enough slow motion shots of amply-bosomed women were used, the film would be improved, all led to my leaving the cinema in a state of shock. How could a film be that bad? How could anyone justify the amount of electricity used to project the film? How could I have paid £7.80 for the most awful hour and a half I have ever spent in a darkened room? The fact that a legless man blasting piranhas out of the water with a shotgun strapped to his prosthetic leg isn't the worst part of the film, speaks volumes. The romantic interest in the film could hardly have been called that and was so unintelligible that I was surprised to find that three people had wasted a large part of their lives writing the screenplay. Indeed, at times I wanted to fling myself into the killer-infested water to end it all.

All the prints of Piranha 3DD deserve to be locked in a box and buried in some Brazilian jungle where they will never be found again. Such a bad film should have made me feel angry when the credits rolled but, to be honest, I was just glad it was over. Offensive and unfunny, Piranha 3DD deserves to sink at the box office as a prime example of how not to make a film. Give me Transformers any day. 

Clapperboard Rating: *