If you’re looking for adventure horror filled with toothy creatures and slick special effects, buy a ticket for Jurassic World Rebirth. On a much smaller scale, however, there’s another new movie whose title says it all: Hot Spring Shark Attack. How does a shark big enough to chomp on a person find its way into a hot spring? And how does a town dependent on tourism deal with this extremely inconvenient new threat? All is revealed in the goofiest ways.
Hot Spring Shark Attack being released so close to Jurassic World Rebirth is probably a coincidence; its proximity to the Jaws 50th anniversary hype likely is not. Writer-director Morihito Inoue is clearly a fan of Steven Spielberg’s first Hollywood smash, as evidenced by the seaside setting, the main characters (mayor, chief of police, shark scientist), the incorporation of one of Jaws‘ most famous lines, the distinctly John Williams-esque score, and even some Amity Island flavor baked into the production design.
But Hot Spring Shark Attack is also very much its own kooky flavor. It takes place in the coastal Japanese hamlet of Atsumi, aka “the Monaco of the East,” where the economy revolves around onsens, or hot springs. The ambitious young mayor has bankrolled an ostentatious hotel he’s crafting with accelerated speed thanks to a giant 3D printer—something we learn about in one of the film’s many cutaways to breathless news reports. It also makes frequent use of social media-style clips; the mayor shoots his own promo videos, and one of his marketing strategies is to lure influencers to town in the hopes that they’ll hype his new resort.
But if you can picture the cast of Jaws using TikTok, you can imagine the PR disaster that unfolds when bodies start washing up on the beach. The local police chief, who is dearly anticipating his imminent retirement, realizes the number of mutilated corpses exactly corresponds with the number of missing tourists reported in the area. Things don’t add up, though, because all the victims were bathing in spa pools, not the nearby ocean.
An eager marine biologist from a nearby university is called in, and it’s not until she identifies the type of shark in their midst that this perplexing mystery is solved. (Let’s just say the fact that shark skeletons are made of cartilage, not bone, is something Hot Spring Shark Attack takes, runs with, and exploits the hell out of.) Chaos continues to ensue—to the point you might suspect Inoue is as big a fan of Sharknado (and possibly Birdemic) as he is of Jaws—until a trio of characters sets out on a hunting mission piloting a specially designed submersible named, what else, the Orca.
If the plot sounds fun but familiar, it is, but the wacky execution and off-kilter choices are Hot Spring Shark Attack‘s true selling points. Special effects are achieved with what look like toys and vintage computer graphics, the editing shamelessly aims for yuks, and the performances are extremely cartoonish—and that includes the sharks, whose powers are so advanced they’re actually able to vocalize. That said, they only seem to know one word, and it comes out as a satisfied hiss: “SHHHHHHHARK!”
Hot Spring Shark Attack is written and directed by Morihito Inoue in his feature debut. The ensemble cast includes a couple of (sort of) recognizable faces—Takuya Fujimura from One Cut of the Dead and Daniel Aguilar from Shin Godzilla—as well as Shôichirô Akaboshi, Masaki Naito, Koichi Makigami, Kiyobumi Kaneko, and Mio Takaki.
You can catch Hot Spring Shark Attack at some Alamo Drafthouse and Cinemark locations July 9; it hits more theaters July 11, when you can also find it on cable VOD and digital HD. Take a bath first, and turn your brain off (complimentary) while you’re at it.
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