Director: Kimble Rendall
Running Time: 89 mins
Certificate: 15
Release Date: April 29th 2013
Bait is a movie about the unluckiest people in the history of mankind. An armed robbery is going on in an underground supermarket in Australia when a tsunami hits and completely floods the place. Many people are killed but the few survivors manage to find safety perching on top of the supermarket shelves. That’d be bad enough, but they soon realise they’re not alone, as the tidal wave has washed a man-killing great white shark into the shop with them.
Oh, and there’s also a live electricity wire sparking, which could kill them all if it hits the water. Suffice to say, nobody in this film is having a good day.
It’s a ridiculous but potentially fun set-up for a movie, but unfortunately Bait manages to take an overblown premise and make it boring. The filmmakers have obviously listened to those who complain that too many high concept thrillers sacrifice character for plot, and so Bait tries to stuff in a lot of people sitting around contemplating their lives and existence. Unfortunately they’re all rather dull people, so every time the film slows down it falls into tedium.
Even the comic relief – a couple trapped in a flooded car – are such annoying people you’re just begging for the shark to get them.
There’s also an issue with watching it in 2D. This is one of those films where it’s clear the director really wanted to deliver 3D thrills, so viewing it in 2D results in numerous shots that don’t quite look right (but which would have been find in the third dimension). Some of the shark attack moments work well anyway, and a couple are great – including a rather daft but very entertaining one where somebody gets chomped in half while hanging from the ceiling.
Even on the level of b-movie trash, Bait is only intermittently entertaining. There are some great moments, but they’re few and far between, and the rest is either tedious character musings or repetitive attempts to escape. Despite its ridiculous premise, there’s plenty of promise with Bait but not much delivery.
I’d even hoped for a bit of gay interest at the beginning when Xavier Samuel’s first line was, “It’s not bad when you get past the gag reflex”, but even that turned out to be more promise than delivery.
Overall Verdict: A farcical but potentially entertaining b-movie premise gets bogged down in tedious characters and a plot that only intermittently brings the thrills.
Reviewer: Tim Isaac
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