Title: Bait
Year: 2012
Nationality: Australian/Singaporean
Starring: Phoebe Tonkin, Xavier Samuel, Julian McMahon, Sharni Vinson, Adrian Pang and others
Directed by: Kimble Rendall
Written by: Russell Mulcahy, John Kim
Cinematography: Ross Emery
Music: Joe Ng, Alex Oh
Budget: 20 million*
Box Office: 29.5 million*
* (I have no idea if these figures represent US, Singapore or Australian Dollars, as it doesn't make it clear. Either way, at least they seem to have made their money back and still had enough to throw a few shrimps on the barbie!)
Billed as
Bait 3D, I can only assume this is one of those movies that focussed on the gorier, more in-your-face aspect of shark movies, and so is unlikely to have been winning any Oscars. The tagline for the movie - “Clean up on aisle 7” - kind of says it all about how serious they were about this. Not very, we can assume, when we meet Josh, a lifeguard who is passed out drunk in his car and once again he's one of two male leads, with the female lead being his girlfriend and (wait for it) the other male lead, Rory's, sister. Well, she's his fiancee, but the relationship dynamic is looking to be almost identical to the one in
The Reef. Not a great start, to be fair. The shark does put in an appearance pretty quickly, taking down a swimmer and really leaving nothing much behind. Rory is also out in the sea, riding a board as he sets a buoy which Josh was supposed to have done, but does not see the attack and though Josh jumps on a waterski to try to get to him to warn him in time, he's unable to save him and his friend is on the menu.
It's a year later, and Josh is still haunted by the death of his friend, and the fact that he could not save him; all he has left of him is a dog tag thing which he keeps as a memory of Rory. He now works as a shelf-stacker in a supermarket, where he sees a young girl shoplifting and being pursued by the store detective. She manages to evade him when she runs into her boyfriend, and the guard is flummoxed. He goes to fetch the store manager, who fires Ryan, her boyfriend, and calls the cops on her. Meanwhile, after Rory's death it's probably obvious that the wedding would have been called off; in fact, Josh and Tina have split up, and now he sees her with her new guy in the shop. Meanwhile, Jaime, the girl who had been shoplifting, turns out to be the daughter of the cop who is called to the scene, and he takes her away with him, disappointed and threatening to “process her” so that she will have to spend the night in jail. She doesn't look impressed. And while they argue, a pair of hard cases prepare to rob the supermarket.
Well, compared to the previous movie there's a lot happening here, though after its initial appearance the shark seems to have faded somewhat from the plotline, but we'll see whether this new direction is going to lead back to the original story. At least it's entertaining. Jaime's father, Todd, notices something is wrong and with a cop's instincts takes his gun and returns to the supermarket, where he gets the drop on Doyle, the raider who had taken the manager hostage, but unbeknownst to him there is a second criminal and he takes a woman hostage, growling at the cop to drop his gun. Mexican standoff, as Jaime re-enters the market, having been told off by her boyfriend. In the confusion someone gets shot, a woman, not sure if it's the same one the other robber was holding hostage.
And then, of course, typically, as anyone could expect and it's the most obvious and predictable thing ever, a tsunami hits! Well of course it does. Doesn't it always? One of the most tired, overused, cliched ... wait. Let's back that up a little. A tsunami? A fu
cking
tsunami hits? Now that's decent writing. Maybe. Everyone freezes for a second, one moment caught forever in time, then a huge wave towers over the land, smashing everything in its path and punching its way into the supermarket, where everything and everyone is swept away.
In the aftermath, the main characters manage to scramble up onto shelves which are above what is now sea level, including Doyle; his partner lies dead, floating in the water. You can see the premise developing already, can't you? Josh finds Tina, in severe shock, and rescues her. Outside, submerged now in a car in which they had been making out, two teens gasp in terror as they spy what looks like a shark behind them. Ryan, also submerged but in his van, manages to break a window and gets out (see “Houston, we have a problem!” section for more); Tina is reunited with her new boyfriend, Steve (boo! Bet Josh had hoped he had drowned. Or worse) and when it becomes apparent that they are unlikely to be rescued, some of them begin to swim off to check out various locations.
Enter, stage left, a shark.
A Great White Shark.
Josh realises too late as he sees various corpses suddenly dip under the water, and shouts to the others, most of whom make it, but one is too slow and becomes the first victim of (oh God I have to say it, don't I?) the supermarket shark.
Outside, Kyle and Heather, the two teens, are attacked by the shark as it batters their car, but it seems to lose interest because there is easier prey back at the market, and there it heads. Now there is another problem, as a loose electrical cable, sparking, threatens to hit the water and electrocute everyone. Anyone figured out the ending yet?
Anyway, Josh decides he can make it to the store room and turn off the power, but he needs to swim there so he gets the others to distract the shark by making as much noise as they can. Seems the shark (if there is only one, which I'm beginning to doubt) is back at the car though, and Ryan watches as our hapless heroes are attacked. He tells them that they must remain still and quiet – the more they scream and thrash about the more the shark will be interested in them - he is going to attract the shark, and that once he does they will have to swim for it to his van.
Back inside the supermarket, Steve has had an idea. He makes some sort of cage (possibly out of old shopping baskets: how do I know? They don't show it) and before he leaves he confides to Josh that Tina never blamed him for her brother's death, and that all the time they were together in Singapore she was thinking about Josh. Sounds like it was fun for our Steve! Anyway he's protected himself as much as he can feasibly do so from the shark, but you'd have to wonder if a flimsy homemade cage of light metal is going to cause a Great White much of a problem. I guess the idea is that the shark won't be bothered chewing through the metal, that it will look elsewhere, for easier, ready-to-eat food. Like a deepsea diver, Steve is paid out on tubing which anchors him to the survivors and provides him a way home, and presumably allows them to attempt to haul him to safety if the shark should attack. He also seems to have rigged up some sort of rudimentary SCUBA breathing apparatus. Ah, ask a diver. Or me arse, whichever you like. Either way, he seems to have taken all the precautions he can reasonably be expected to.
He makes it, turns off the power but then gets caught on something and can't make it back, and so dies a hero's death, dragged down to the bottom of what is now the sea. Josh, always the one with the ideas it seems (apart from poor old dead Steve) notices a skylight, and they rig up some rope to make a pulley, hoisting the smallest of them, the manager of the store, up towards it. The idea is of course for him to come back with help, but he's a selfish, mean little guy and we all know that he's only going to save his own skin. Heather and Kyle make a run for it when Ryan uses the severed hand of a corpse to put blood in the water and attract the shark, though little Bully isn't so lucky. As the manager makes it up to the top one of the pipes breaks and disgorges a load of crabs, and he almost loses his nerve; they go to pull him back down but he gathers his reserve and says he can make it, at which point the shark jumps out of the water below and chomps him in half.
Outside in the car park, Ryan attempts to make it over to where Kyle and Heather are by using some piping running along the roof, looking down anxiously into the water as he goes. He spies the shark, just under the water. Surely they wouldn't use the same scene twice in as many minutes? No, he falls into the water at the last moment, swims like f
uck to get to the van, makes it and then the shark grabs Kyle. Aw. I had hoped the two of them would make it. The rest of the film won't be the same without their banter.
In another of the series of wild plans, Doyle decides to try catching the shark (yes, you read that correctly) by using some raw meat baited on a hook snaffled from the hardware department but Todd, distrustful of the robber, declares he will do it himself. As he makes to launch himself into the water, however, Jaime jumps in. She is attacked by the shark but manages to hit it on the snout, which at least demonstrates good knowledge of sharks – or maybe she just gets lucky. At any rate, she gets back with the meat and the hook, scrambling back up onto the shelf. Josh reveals to Tina that he blames himself for Rory's death: if he had not been so drunk then Rory would not have to have set the buoy; it would have been him who had died. Kirby, one of the other survivors, now reveals that he is the other robber, and that the dead body they saw in the water wearing the mask he had had on for the robbery was obviously not him; he put the mask on an anonymous corpse to throw suspicion off himself. Now he reveals his true colours. As the shark fails to take the bait (literally) he decides live meat is what it wants, and, producing his gun, pushes Naomi (another survivor who really up to this point has not been mentioned or had much to do, so she's clearly there to fulfill just one role) in, attached to the hook. While she is struggling in the water, with the shark homing in on her, Doyle throws a spear through Kirby's back. As he falls, they help Naomi up out of the water and Kirby takes her place. Oddly enough, the plan works: the hook Doyle rammed into Kirby's back sticks in the shark's mouth, it's attached to a rope and the shark is caught, allowing them to swim to the entrance.
Outside, though distraught at the loss of her boyfriend, Heather is overjoyed to see that her dog has made it after all, and she is reunited with Bully. Believing this to be a sign, Ryan starts tapping the overhead pipes, hoping the sound will echo inside and someone will her him. Someone does: Jaime sets off in search of him, and Josh goes after her. As they make it out to the car park and join Ryan and Heather, Jaime realises that the car they are standing on is her father's, and there is a gun in the back. As the others make noise to attract the shark, Josh gets the shotgun and also picks up a taser, and gets back to the roof of the car. He shoots at the shark but the recoil takes him off the car and into the water. As he floats underwater, gun ready, he watches the shark approach. At the last instant he fires, there is an explosion of blood and guts, and a second later he emerges unscathed. The shark is now scattered all over the water. Well, one of them.
Now that they have made it out into the car park, Doyle prepares to blow up a truck that has jammed the entrance, which will allow them to escape. Just then an aftershock hits and more debris is thrown into the area, and the jolt shakes the other shark loose. As it approaches, Josh aims his gun but it is out of ammunition, so he uses a taser instead, aiming it at the shark's tender nose, the shock eventually killing it. Doyle then sets the charges and the vehicle blows. As they clamber out into the sunlight the survivors can see the level of devastation that has been wrought by the tsunami. In a rather downbeat ending (well, I guess it was a disaster movie, after all) Tina asks Josh what will he do now, and he says he'll start over.
Quotes
Manager: “You! This is all your fault!”
Doyle: “Not today, boy, not me. Today Mother Nature's thrown all the sinners down here.”
Kyle: “Give me your shoes.”
Heather: “What?”
Kyle: “I need something pointy to break the glass. Give me your shoe.”
Heather: “These are three hundred dollar Guccis!”
Kyle (after an embarrassed pause): “They're not.”
Heather: “Well, when you gave them to me you said they were.”
Kyle: “I know I said they were, but they're not.”
Heather: “You got me cheap knockoffs? I can't believe you!”
Manager: “This is so not happening! You're a cop! Do something!”
(What does he expect him to do: arrest the shark?)
Heather: “Do you see it anywhere?”
Kyle: “Yeah, I see it, but I'm keeping it from you cos I want it to be a surprise!”
Heather: “Do something, Kyle! You have to do something!”
Kyle: “Oh yeah? Like what? Ask the bastard to go away??”
Heather: “You're a murderer.”
Kyle: “No I'm not!”
Heather: “Yes you are. You're a dog murderer, which is worse than a person murderer!”
Good scenes
You can see exactly where the scenes meant to be seen in 3D are, and the attack on Rory, as the shark breaches, coming out of the water and shattering his board before diving back underwater to take him down with it, is well done. I'd say that would have had a few people jumping in the cinema!
Just as effective is the moment when the tsunami hits, which again I'm sure looks great in 3D. But more importantly is the, if you will, calm before the storm. The lead-up to the big disaster is very well done. You have the standoff between cop and robber, two teenagers arguing over petty things – he, his job that he has just lost, she, her overbearing father – and outside we see a baby sitting on the beach looking out to sea. Suddenly a mother snatches the child away. A lifeguard looks out and begins to roar, restauranteurs watch with stupefied disbelief as a massive wave rolls in towards them, sending the restaurant exploding into pieces as they run, and in the market, all hell breaks loose.
As the guys realise suddenly there's a shark in the water, Jaime tries to help one of them, who is being attacked, climb out. She grabs his flailing hand, pulls and ... is left holding the arm as the rest of him is bitten away and sinks underwater.
The scene where the shark jumps out of the water and eats the manager (or at least, his bottom half) is pretty gory and silly and also great, and must have looked excellent in 3D. It's also very unexpected, as your attention has been intentionally diverted by the scuttling crabs, so it comes as a shock.
Puke-inducing as it is that the little dog has survived, the scene where Bully floats in on a makeshift board, yapping away, is well handled.
The final scene, where a seagull heads out over the water only to be eaten by a jumping shark, the final 3D scare I guess, is funny and serves to lighten the somewhat dark ending.