Thrash (2026)

Here we go with a Sony quintessential 'popcorn flick' that thrives on a regular lack of logic and blatant product placement for Xperia phones! Which is highly unlikely in the USA as Sony don't sell them there! Anyway, don't let that spoil things for you - there's plenty more that can ably do that to come! The director was Tommy Wirkola, who also directed a film I enjoyed very much and reviewed here on my blog in the shape of What Happened to Monday (2017).

Hurricane Henry makes landfall on the East Coast of America. The residents of a coastal town are advised to get to higher ground. Most do, but some don’t. Our core group of characters are trapped in various ways, locations and situations. This includes a heavily pregnant woman, a spunky teen who is unwell and still reeling from her parents' death - and a group of foster kids being mistreated by a placement family who are only in it for the money.

There is a scientist kicking about who has been tracking six sharks in the nearby waters - one of which is a huge Great White. He eventually teams up in a boat with an annoying reporter (and cameraman) who is only interested in himself and a headline-grabbing story for his TV channel. As you can see, the film is set up with various tropes intended to create tension in a disaster movie. Unfortunately, it doesn't really work!

The storm hits with surprisingly decent CGI, showing the town being swallowed by the Atlantic. Suddenly, the power cuts, the TV goes blank and the mobile masts fail - leaving everyone with no way to get help. The sharks, pushed inland by the surge, begin their hunt!

Some of the editing in the film is ruthless. One example is when our spunky but ill teen conquers her fear to rescue the pregnant woman from a car where she is trapped by a tree. One second they are just getting out of the car; the next, they are in the house. The film completely ignores the clearly perilous journey between the two - a journey that took the teen ages to navigate alone, let alone with a heavily pregnant woman in tow!

True to the genre, the 'nasty' characters are picked off with clinical precision by the Family Shark! Snatched through windows or pulled under in pools of blood while making a run (or swim) for it, they meet their comeuppance. Others show cowardice, selfishly leaving the 'nice' people in the lurch or using them as human shields. Some of the shark footage appears to be real, and the bits that clearly aren't have been done well enough to be convincing - though much of it is hidden behind thrashing and splashing!

Eventually, the storm breaks and the waters become calm and flat, but they are still populated by hungry sharks. The closest we get to any tension is when one of the heroes dives into a flooded cellar to retrieve something. He holds his breath, gets his jumper snagged on a piece of debris (of course he does) and we see a shark heading down after him. But to be honest, there is very little tension elsewhere, which is a shame.

While the shark footage is decent enough, the town's destruction is the CGI standout. However, the editing remains the film's biggest mystery. The jump-cuts between life-threatening situations and 'safe and sound' domestic settings suggest a significant amount of footage was left on the cutting-room floor. The lead actors executed their parts acceptably, I suppose, but no Oscars will be heading their way - and I didn't recognise any of them. Some of the camerawork was good enough, but the best of it was the CGI. As I said at the outset, it’s a good 90-minute popcorn romp, but it will be easily and readily forgotten.