FRANKENFISH SyFy

Frankenfish: Movie Review

Grade: C+

Like so many other films these days (Snakehead Terror, Sea Beast), Frankenfish is a mutated man-eating fish SciFi channel movie. This film was actually based, along with Snakehead Terror, on the snakehead fish incident in a pond in Maryland. The snakehead fish is real, and it is voracious, but the snakehead creatures in Frankenfish aren't.

The movie's plot, as interesting as it sounds, looks great at first glance: A hunter who would like to hunt and kill something really dangerous and life-threatening breeds three genetically altered snakehead fish in Asia, and has ships to him in America. But when they are being shipped down the Louisiana bayou, something goes wrong, and they escape the ship, loose deep inside the bayou...Now a medical examiner investigating the bodies the fish leave behind is trapped in a small houseboat community, and must, along with the community, find a way out.

The plot had so much going for it, yet the movie plods along for most of its gory and blood-soaked 84 minute running-time. The acting is quite good though, and is much better than normal SyFy channel fare.

The things that set the movie the movie back are A) the clichéd characters, B) at times, the horrible and silly dialogue, and, C) you don't really see the fish. I know a horror technique is to keep the monster in shadow, but in this case, the fish is almost never seen, not till the last part of the movie. And after I expected much more, the conclusion felt rushed, and wasn't worth the time I spent wondering what the fish looked like. Seriously, the cover of the DVD shows more of the fish than most of the actual movie!

But Frankenfish still tries to be good and scary, and at times the creepy level is pretty high. The CGI effects are that bad either, and for a SyFy film that's a plus. I just want to see the fish! More man-eating fishes, please!!!