Doll Shark (2022)

I have a weakness for shark movies. And there are a lot of them out there. While there are a few good ones (Jaws, obviously, and Open Water, The Shallows, The Reef) and some incredibly enjoyable ones (The Meg, Sharknado, Mega Shark Vs. Giant Octopus), most of them are just bad. But I still love them. Well, most of them. Doll Shark has a few good things going for it, but it is undeniably a bad movie. It begins with a man determined to hunt some special shark. Does he do this in a boat? Nope. He stands on what seems to be a pier, and just leans down and spears the shark, all while the worst rain effect ever seen in a movie plays over the image. Seriously, what the fuck is up with that rain effect? Anyway, the guy takes a tooth from the shark, then purchases a plush shark toy for his son, and shoves the tooth inside it for some reason. I guess it is to make the toy a little more dangerous. But what it does is… I don’t know... makes the spirit of the shark inhabit the toy? Something like that.

The boy is excited to have the toy. His favorite television program is a shark show that apparently plays constantly on some bizarre network. The show, however, seems to be only fifteen or twenty seconds long, because every time he starts to watch it, it is the same short sequence that he sees. It’s a sequence which we would think would be the show’s introduction, but seems to be the entire fucking show. Very strange. Although finally at one point later in the film, we see a clown, which might be part of that show. A clown whose script is in front of him and slightly to his right. Just watch his eyes. What the boy is not excited about is his babysitter. Now, look, if you write a part for a 17-year-old and you can’t find a 17-year-old, it might be best to rewrite the part. But that is not what the makers of this film did. They just went ahead with a woman who is clearly forty playing the part as written. That’s right, a 40-year-old babysitter. A 40-year-old babysitter who hates children and is using the babysitting opportunity to invite her friend and some boys over. I’m not kidding. And this isn’t a one-time thing. This woman is the kid’s regular babysitter. So this is her fucking job. Babysitting. She’s forty.

She does have a car, so maybe she charges a lot for her services. She is the only character in the entire movie who has a car, so I guess everyone else in this town is even more of a loser than she is. (The mother’s boyfriend has a car, but he’s only there for a moment and I don’t recall him having any lines.) Well, this babysitter makes fun of the child she’s babysitting, even takes his plush toy and puts it on top of the trash bin (not in it, just sets it on top of it), and even drugs him to make him sleep though a good portion of the film. You might want to also sleep through a good portion of it. I couldn’t fault you for that. Anyway, the plush shark comes alive and first kills a couple of neighbors. Well, actually, it seems that only one of the victims lived there, and the other was a guy she picked up. There’s an unfortunate scene where the neighbor tries to seduce the man by taking off part of her bathing suit in the pool. This is the most horrifying moment of the movie. “Please keep your clothes on,” you will shout at the screen. The plush shark also attacks the babysitter, her ridiculous friend, and the two boys that are coming over to score with them. And a burglar. The burglar bit is actually funny, because of the items he takes. He grabs a cordless phone, but not the phone’s base. He grabs a single letter from a drawer of papers. He grabs one specific DVD from the shelf of movies. Who is this guy? By the way, this is apparently the house to enter without permission. A total of four characters break into the house (five, if you count the cop, who does not announce himself as he enters). Meanwhile, the child sleeps on. The child, by the way, gives the best performance of the movie. He’s really not bad at all, even when he’s awake.

The worst performance of the movie? That’s a tough one, because there are a lot of people in the running, including the drunk mother who has no relationship with her son whatsoever. But I would have to go with the child’s father, who really loves talking to himself. He does try to talk to someone else at one point. He calls his son, but there is no answer. This alarms him. Why? It is unclear. He doesn’t know anything about his ex-wife having left the boy with a 40-year-old babysitter, or about the murders next door, but maybe this is the first time he has called home and no one has answered. Oh, that reminds me. That phone the burglar took? We see it ringing in this scene. So that means that the plush shark, after killing the burglar, took the phone out of his bag and placed it back where it belongs. I imagine it did that with the DVD, letter and other items as well. Anyway, there is a cop who is completely unbelievable and also pretty fucking bad at his job, who is trying to track the murderer of the neighbors. But it is the father, who, because of his bad feeling, takes a week off from his job to rescue his son. Why a week? Well, it probably takes him that long to walk there. He shows up in the boy’s bedroom and spears the plush shark. And that’s when the boy wakes up. Of course, he should be like, “Why the fuck are you destroying my toy?” After all, he has slept through all the death and whatnot, and has absolutely no idea that the plush toy is possessed or alive or whatever. But he is just happy that he has one parent there, a parent who is not drunk. So, a happy ending.

What is good about this movie? Well, I love the look of the plush shark when it turns from a regular plush toy to a blood-thirsty killer. Seriously, it’s wonderful. And that goes a long way. There are some good, funny shots with the shark. And, as I said, the boy gives a decent performance. That’s about it. While this is not a good movie, it is definitely not the worst shark movie I’ve seen. Oh no, not even close.

12 Christmas Wishes For My Dog (2011)

I know, I know, you’re thinking, “Come on, Michael, how could a movie with the title 12 Christmas Wishes For My Dog be any good?” Well, regarding that title, it itself is a bit of a lie, for the wishes are not for her dog. The wishes have nothing whatsoever to do with her dog, which is interesting, since she has to leave her dog in a shelter after ignoring the rules of her apartment building, and that dog could have benefited from a wish. But I’m getting ahead of myself. This movie, which actually was originally titled 12 Wishes Of Christmas, stars Elisa Donovan as Laura, a selfish, horrible woman who is granted twelve wishes from an angel in an ugly Christmas sweater in order to help her sort out her life. So the title should be 12 Christmas Wishes For Me, And Everyone Else Can Go Fuck Themselves.

The movie begins with Laura running late for work and being stopped by a neighbor (played by Michael Gross, who in the years since Family Ties and Tremors has done a lot of Christmas movies) who asks her if she has a dog. He reminds her that the rules explicitly state that no dogs are allowed, and so Laura lies to him. (I understand that in this scene we are supposed to think her neighbor an unreasonable bastard and Laura a sweet victim, but clearly she’s a bitch with no regard for other people.) She then hurries off to work, and – horror of horrors – the heel on one of her shoes breaks. Could life be any worse than this? This is a woman who could really use twelve wishes, clearly. When she arrives to work, she apologizes for being late, and her boss (played by Fred Willard, who must have owed the film’s director a serious favor) shows he could not care less about her by calling her the wrong name. He then goes on to say that fifteen percent of the work force will be fired by the end of the year, and that he is determined to turn things around by getting his company’s new holiday line on the shelves of some expensive department store. Drama! Laura also volunteers a bit of her time at Best Buddies, a dog shelter, where she meets Andy (David O’Donnell), a man who is inexplicably attracted to her. But Laura already has a boyfriend, and because that boyfriend is taking her out to a nice restaurant, she assumes he’s going to ask for her hand in marriage. When, instead, Morgan (Michael Bergin) asks if she’ll stick with him if he follows his dream of becoming a novelist, Laura is shocked. This dinner wasn’t about her after all. How could this terrible man decide to quit his job and pursue his dreams, when Laura has so much riding on his having a high-paying job? “What about us?” she asks, but we know she means, “What about me?” Could things be going any worse for her?

Soon she is confronted by her neighbor and by the woman who is apparently in charge of the building. The woman tells her she has to get rid of the dog or find a new home. So she gets rid of the dog, leaving it at the shelter where she volunteers. She promises the dog she’ll have her out of there by Christmas. Because Christmas means a lot to that dog. And then Laura is accused of being at fault for a screw-up at work, when a woman representing that department store decides to act like the most ridiculous, angry, self-righteous person on the planet, and then never lets that attitude drop, for reasons which might only be clear to the actor playing that role. Anyway, Laura is fired. Her friend, Faith, who works at the same company, suggests Laura hire a life coach. And because Laura has no other friends who might offer better advice, she does just that. When she walks into the life coach’s office, she remarks at the décor, saying, “Wow, somebody really likes Christmas.” It’s an absurd thing to say, because Laura herself has more Christmas decorations than does the average department store. Anyway, Noel (the life coach, played by Chonda Pierce) tells Laura she’s going to grant her twelve wishes. In most stories regarding wishes, the total is three, but Laura deserves so much more than that. Her first wish: “I wish Morgan would send me flowers.” The next morning, there are flowers from Morgan at her doorstep. Okay, the first wish was wasted, but she didn’t really believe in wishes at that point. But now that she’s aware this thing is the real deal, she’ll give each wish a lot more care and consideration and choose things that will change the world for the better, right? Fuck no. Faith is going to a Christmas party, and her ex-boyfriend will be there with his new girlfriend, and so she wants to look good. So Laura’s next wish is “I wish for Faith’s hair to look fabulous at her party.” Okay, this wish is for her friend, not her, so maybe it’s a step in the right direction. But her friend is being a dipshit, wanting to impress an ex-boyfriend who has moved on. This could not be less important. Two wishes completely wasted. Also, if she’s going to wish for her friend’s hair to look fabulous, why limit it to “at her party”?

Third wish: “I wish for the banging to stop.” What she refers to there is her neighbor’s work inside his own apartment. Now, in every other story about wishes, one has to be precise in each wish, for the powers seem to love messing with mortals. But not in this movie. No, because that would be fun. Here, Noel knows just what Laura means, and takes care of it by having the neighbor evicted. Laura sees him getting his eviction notice, goes into her apartment, and makes her fourth wish. “I wish I had better shoes.” Yes, she is a despicable, horrid little person. She then wishes to win the car being raffled by the animal shelter, and soon is making wish after wish: “I wish I had 20/20 vision,” “I wish I could win the Lotto” (again, poorly worded, but Noel gives it to her), “I wish for a new wardrobe” (didn’t the money from winning the lottery take care of that?), and “I wish for new jewelry” (again, couldn’t she buy that with the money from the lottery?). Not only is she selfish, but she’s an imbecile without a trace of imagination. Basically, she is a character you cannot help but loathe. You want her to somehow step out of this film and into Friday The 13th Part Whatever, where Jason Voorhees would quickly drain her of blood.

Meanwhile, at work, Laura’s former boss (yeah, for some reason, we’re still following his story) tells his remaining employees they must come up with good ideas within twenty-four hours, ideas on getting the holiday line into that department store. Because department stores are apparently still really important in the world of this film. Faith is worried she’s next in line to get fired, so Laura’s next wish is “I wish Faith would have a winning idea.” Again, that’s vague, but again Noel knows just what Laura means. So Faith has the brilliant idea of holding a fashion show. Original, eh? “It’s bold and exciting,” Faith says. Oh? But another woman at the company steals the idea as her own. And Fred Willard says, “That is pure genius.” So Laura uses her eleventh wish: “I wish Sandra would pay for stealing Faith’s idea.” Bloody hell. You just want to put all these characters into a giant blender and press “Grind.” I’m just glad Morgan is busy working on his novel and not getting involved with his girlfriend’s stupid life. But then for her final wish, Laura types, “I wish Morgan’s book would be published.” It’s not for his sake, however; it’s because she wants to get married, and knows that won’t happen until the book is published. Awful. But Morgan is a bit smarter, and begins dating his literary agent. Good for him!

Anyway, Laura gets into an argument with her friend at work, causing Faith to quit, and catches her boyfriend kissing a better woman (Nadine has no lines, but it’s safe to assume she’s a better woman). So her life is still a mess, and she seeks advice from Noel. The rest of the movie is Laura doing what she assumes is the best for everyone, but who gives a shit at this point?

So what is good about this movie? Fred Willard is always good, and even though he is not invested in this role, he still manages to elicit some laughter. When Sandra begs him to be able to keep her job, saying she needs it, he replies: “Cry me a river. Get out of my sight.” It’s so abrupt that we can’t help but laugh. We wish he’d say that to all the other characters. Also, Michael Gross at one point says, “The wrench just bounced off the plate in my head,” a surprising line. And Mo Gaffney shows up for a few moments as Laura’s mother. She is only at the other end of a couple of phone calls, and not put to any good use, but it’s nice to see her. The one other good moment is during a scene in a shopping mall. The production hired several extras, but obviously did not completely own the location, so there are some actual shoppers there. One woman walks by and notices the camera, and is clearly alarmed to find herself in the frame. Her reaction is delightful. There is one other thing. If you’re a music fan, you might recognize singer/songwriter Shannon Hurley as an extra in a scene inside a coffee shop. And that’s about it.