Curse of the Kraken
release year: 2020
genre: giant monster mayhem
viewing setting: home streaming 4/18/23
synopsis: A giant sea monster that can turn its victims into zombies menaces a variety of people.
impressions: This was another in our recent binge of cheesy giant monster movies from China. Of the ones we've watched thus far, this was also the most balls-out batshit crazy of them all. It started out as something simple - a small crew aboard a small boat is having a voyage - but before long, all sorts of strange things started happening, including but not limited to: horrible dubbing with insanely goofy American voices...an octopus-eating contest...a kraken attacking a crowded beach...and having the ability to mutate victims...bad CGI...infected zombies that resemble Abe Sapien from the Hellboy series, or the Creature from the Black Lagoon...said zombies being quite nimble and athletic, including leaping martial-arts-type moves and a Spider-Man like ability to stick to walls...spastic camera work...a doctor who's also a super scientist and knows everything the plot calls for...pirates led by an angry chick with purple lipstick...the world's most inane standoff...the pirates' island base...a random flying two-headed shark (which nobody questions at all)...a pirate priest (?) with rapist tendencies, a thirst for booze, and a head like a deflated grape...the pirate fortress...one pirate wearing what appear to be gym shorts...cannibal beetles (which very much resemble the army ants in the fourth Indiana Jones movie)...the kraken jumping onto land and rolling around like a giant living tumbleweed...insane science used to stop all the monsters. I want to take a moment to talk more about these pirates. They live on an island, have a fortress, and are apparently really good at capturing ships...yet there only seem to be about two dozen of them, they act silly, and they're stupid. Their big plan is apparently to "capture the monster" and yet when they get their big chance, they fail utterly. It's just silly. The real curse here isn't the kraken, it's the planning abilities of the pirate gang.
acting: The dubbing makes this tough to judge, but worse, at the time of this writing I can't find a full cast list online. The standout performances were the stupid silly girl (we were calling her "the fruitloop" after the second or third dumb thing she did), the angry-looking pirate leader chick, and the old captain who just wants to retire.
final word: This is what happens when you take pieces of numerous better movies, throw them all in a blender, and then assemble the paste via a movie company from another continent...it's entertaining, but crazy.
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