Lake Victoria has been overrun by a ravenous school of predators: college students on Spring Break. Lucky for filmgoers, a tremor has released thousands of hungry prehistoric piranhas ready to turn the college kids into an all-you-can-eat buffet. The plot of “Piranha 3D” is a simple formula that results in a cheese-filled 88 minutes that are full of more laughs than scares.
“Piranha” is not a particularly effective horror film. “Piranha 3D” is a full-blown B-movie, reminiscent of the laughable gore-fests such as “The Evil Dead” or “Tremors.” “Piranha” knows it’s a B-movie and runs with it. The story follows Jake Forester, a cookie-cutter, nerdy protagonist who agrees to act as a guide for a smarmy “Wild Wild Girls” director in town to make his latest Spring Break smut, just as the lake becomes a blood bath.
Like a good bad horror movie, there is a good helping of scares and gross-out moments throughout the film. The fish are menacing and lend themselves to an abundance of jumps and screams. The film is also full of some legitimately tense underwater scenes of unsuspecting victims in the style of “Jaws.” Likewise, fans of “Jaws” will appreciate the many references to the film, including the opening scene starring Richard Dreyfuss reprising his role of Matt Hooper.
The 3-D format lends itself well to the B-movie format. When a giant man-eating fish suddenly jumps out of the screen, it’s hard not to be startled. The usual gross-out moments are intensified by the added dimension. For example, cinematic history was made when one tequila-filled student vomits in slow-motion directly at the camera—in eye-popping 3-D.
The “Wild Wild Girls” director, played by Jerry O’Connell, is the womanizer you love to hate and gets what he deserves in the highly publicized “severed penis in 3-D” scene that had everyone in the theater in stitches. There are plenty of gore-filled moments that will make viewers simultaneously cringe and laugh. This is especially true near the end, as the fish attack a wet T-shirt contest in the middle of the lake and hundreds of college kids are massacred in over-the-top and truly imaginative ways.
“Piranha 3D” is a film that will make you jump, cringe and roll your eyes, but laugh the whole way through. It’s the type of movie that best enjoyed with a bunch of friends on a late night and is well worth the price of admission.