Sky Sharks Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		0.5
Video		4.0
Audio		3.0
Extras		0.5
Overall		0.5

Sky Sharks Blu-ray Movie Review

Mom: "We have Snakes on a Plane at home."

Reviewed by Randy Miller III February 22, 2021

"Zombie Nazis and flying sharks -- what more could you want?", trumpets the back cover of Marc Fehse's Sky Sharks. How about a movie that didn't feel like it was made by a sixth grader? This abysmal attempt at cheeky, over-the-top horror schlock is so misguided, terribly crafted and, perhaps worst of all, dreadfully boring that it absolutely, positively doesn't need to be seen to be believed. I've reviewed DVDs and Blu-rays for going on 20 years now and this might be the biggest waste of plastic since those America Online free trial discs. And it broke a Kickstarter goal?

Sky Sharks' cold open at least delivers on its title when a plane full of walking clichés is decimated by Nazi air pirates riding mechanized sharks, using all manner of sharp weapons to reign unholy terror on the unwitting passengers. From there, it rewinds to exposition mode with the uncomfortable father-daughter team of Dr. Klaus Richter (Thomas Morris) and Angelique (Barbara Nedeljakova) -- she's hot, of course, and he's 115 thanks to gene therapy and looks about as convincing as Guy Ritchie in Prometheus. Angelique's also got a twin sister named Diabla (Eva Habermann), another low-cut-top scientist who's en route to the Antarctic where a Nazi warship houses her dad's experimental technology created during The Third Reich. Desperate to destroy his unholy life's work (which, yes, involves those undead Nazi soldiers and mecha-sharks), they instead reactivate the technology and, well, the shit hits the fan.

While that above synopsis suggests at least a halfway fun and entertaining guilty pleasure flick, let me again remind you that Sky Sharks is total amateur hour from start to finish, save for a few visual effects. Any good will is absolutely squashed by bad editing, poor performances, horrible dialogue, and a disjointed format that makes its otherwise plain story almost impossible to follow -- scenes crash into each other constantly, sometimes broken up by Paul Verhoeven-style commercials that don't work any better. I guarantee you'll either be bored to tears or just rendered dumbstruck by the 30-minute mark, but Sky Sharks insists on a triple-digit runtime. Mercifully, the credits roll after 91 minutes but even they include a bonus scene, slow image crawls, a trailer for the sequel Sky Frogs that hopefully never gets made, and even a gag commercial for the 16-bit video game adaptation. Were these stretch goals or something?

Unlike the filmmakers, I won't waste any more of your time. I'll just leave you with a clear warning that whatever you think you'll get out Sky Sharks... you won't. It's a total mess, nowhere close to "so bad it's good", and ultimately feels like a bottom-tier Troma movie without all that pesky humor and self-awareness. MPI's Blu-ray offers little more than a passable A/V presentation, but there's a bright side: at least I didn't have to sit through any extras.

Sky Sharks Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Making the most of dour circumstances, MPI's 1080p transfer of Sky Sharks at least serves up a decent presentation that's far better than the film deserves. A huge portion of this movie is green-screened which gives it a flat and lifeless appearance outpaced by most YouTube productions, with most scenes employing student-level compositions and editing that distracts from the story's flow and pacing. From that perspective it's tough to evaluate objectively but, based on the film's overall appearance and MPI's solid track record on Blu-ray, there don't look to be any genuine problems here. Black levels run nice and deep, the mostly muddy color palette is broken up by vivid primaries, and good authoring ensures that compression issues are kept to an absolute minimum. In short, it's lipstick on a pig.

Sky Sharks Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Seams show in the audio department and, though I'm not sure of this German-based production's original language, the lip movements match up well enough that this DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio might as well be it. (Is it bad that I have to guess?) This is a poorly-mixed track where music often overpowers dialogue -- an improvement, in some cases -- and a few early lines even have a distinct buzzing and popping that definitely doesn't sound like a disc flaw. Beyond that, action scenes have a cut-and-paste vibe in which their rare strengths sound anything but organic and, while the combination of music and sound occasionally reaches modest heights, this is rough road for the most part. Two English subtitle tracks are included: a full set, as well as an option that only translates foreign dialogue and signs.

Sky Sharks Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

This one-disc release arrives in a standard keepcase with minimal bonus features.

• Trailer (0:59) - This short promotional piece can also be seen here.

Sky Sharks Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Marc Fehse's Sky Sharks was several years in the making, with a Kickstarter campaign that launched in 2015 and netted a whopping 907 backers. It's now almost six years later and the result is a very early front-runner for the most inessential Blu-ray release of 2021. This is a mostly brain-dead production with terrible dialogue, shoddy construction, and basically no real redeeming value. Even the most curious schlock-hounds should stay far, far away.