Killer Fish (1979) AFD/Horror-Thriller RT: 101 minutes Rated PG (violence, frightening scenes) Director: Anthony M. Dawson (Antonio Margheriti) Screenplay: Michael Rogers Music: Guido and Maurizio de Angelis Cinematography: Alberto Spagnoli Release date: December 7, 1979 (US) Cast: Lee Majors, Karen Black, Margaux Hemingway, Marisa Berenson, James Franciscus, Gary Collins, Charles Guardino, Frank Pesce, Dan Pastorini, Roy Brocksmith, Anthony Steffen, Fabio Sabag. Box Office: N/A
Rating: ***
Let’s do a little movie genealogy Biblical style. As Jaws begat Piranha, Piranha begat Killer Fish making it a third generation rip-off. It’s not a purebred horror movie however. In its DNA, you’ll also find a heist thriller and traces of a disaster movie. This mixing of genres forms an entertaining hunk of bunk that rises above other cinematic junk on sheer spunk. It shouldn’t come as any surprise that it’s the work of Anthony M. Dawson [aka Antonio Margheriti], that Italian auteur who also gave us Yor, the Hunter from the Future and Code Name: Wild Geese.
Talk about a winning cast, wait until you get a load of the line-up in Killer Fish. Lee Majors, the Six Million Dollar Man himself, stars as Robert Lasky, the leader of a band of thieves who pull off a daring robbery at a mine in Brazil. By way of distraction, they blow up a nearby oil refinery so they can sneak into the mine’s vault and steal a sizable stash of gemstones. They manage to evade the police and report back to the guy who masterminded the operation, Paul Diller (Franciscus, Beneath the Planet of the Apes). It’s decided it would be best to hide the loot until the heat dies down. It’s dropped into a nearby reservoir. The gang, which also includes Kate (Black, Airport 1975), agrees to reconvene in 60 days to split it up.
That old saying about no honor among thieves is once again proven when two of the thieves return to the reservoir to steal the gems for themselves. When one of them goes into the water to retrieve the sunken treasure, he comes out screaming. It seems that Paul has secretly stocked the water with piranha because he doesn’t trust his hired crooks. Gee, imagine that. Could he possibly intend to steal it all for himself?
In a subplot that exists only to provide more human fish food, Robert finds romance with Gabrielle (Hemingway, Lipstick), a fashion model who arrives at the resort with her entourage that includes manager Ann (Berenson, Barry Lyndon), effeminate photographer Ollie (Brocksmith, Tango & Cash) and pilot Tom (Collins, Hangar 18).
What follows is a series of double-crosses, back-stabbings and greed-induced paranoia as the gang tries to figure out a way to get back their loot without being devoured by the titular killer fish. That’s when Killer Fish shifts into disaster movie mode with a tropical storm that causes the dam to break thereby releasing the deadly piranha into the lake where the surviving characters up to this point are trapped on a sinking tour boat.
Although it’s technically NOT my first time seeing Killer Fish, I may as well have made it a “First-Time Friday Feature” on my website. I saw it when it aired on network TV in ’82, but remember next to nothing about it except Hemingway. Nothing jogged my memory as I watched it on Grindhouse Monday. Of course, certain details wouldn’t have meant anything to me back then. At 14, I knew nothing of Dawson/Margheriti or cheap Italian knock-off movies. I tuned in because it was the only show in town (we didn’t get cable TV until ’83). Watching it now, I know exactly what it is and for what it is, it’s pretty good.
Isn’t it odd that a movie called Killer Fish is rated PG? Most filmmakers would go for the R so they can show the bloody piranha attacks. Nevertheless, it has a few neat shots of piranhas feeding on the cast and grisly skeletal remains. Remember, you could get away with a lot more in a PG movie in ’79 than now. The piranha sequences are a combination of real footage and animatronics. I don’t know how much money Dawson had to work with (it wasn’t much obviously), but he does a decent job with the visuals especially the miniature effects in a few scenes- e.g. the oil refinery and dam explosions, the power plant flooding. The rear projection shots of people running away from said catastrophes look fake, but that’s part of the appeal.
The cast, by and large, does a respectable job playing stock characters. Majors, who made an acting career out of his furrowed brow expression, is good as the hero of the bunch. He’s the one that steps up to save the others from certain death either by killer fish or killer Franciscus. As the villain, James camps it up nicely with a suitably smarmy demeanor and evil expression as he sends others to their deaths. Black’s character is too vaguely defined. If I had to put a label on Kate, it would be “lying B who can’t be trusted”. Hemingway shows she’s a model first, last and everything in between with her wooden performance. She’s fine when she just stands around and poses; it’s when she tries to act that she gets into trouble. She can’t read lines to save her life.
Brocksmith, with all his swishing around and snarky comments, overplays it as a stereotypical gay guy. Based on that alone, you can tell Killer Fish is a 70s movie. And if not that, then the characters’ wardrobes or the cheesy disco song by Amii Stewart (“The Winner Takes All”) that closes the movie. This is also part of its goofball appeal.
There’s a lot I like about Killer Fish, the mash-up of genres, the effects and the killer fish, but what I like most is its sense of conviction. Dawson isn’t out to redefine a genre; he’s out to exploit it. He’s doesn’t try and hide it either. He just wants to show his audience a good time and largely succeeds. Killer Fish is killer fun.
