Hai-Alarm auf Mallorca

Stumbling upon the 2004 German shark-themed movie titled "Hai-Alarm auf Mallorca" (aka "Shark Attack in the Mediterranean"), by random luck here in 2023, of course I opted to sit down and watch it. Sure, I wasn't harboring any expectations to the movie, given it being a German shark movie. But my love of the shark genre made me give the movie a fair chance.

Writers Jörg Alberts, Roland Heep, Frank Koopmann and Don Schubert put together a fair enough script. Sure, it was a very, very generic and predictable shark movie. And the storyline definitely was flawed, no doubt about it. But there are worse shark movies out there, actually.

I wasn't familiar with the cast ensemble in the movie, aside from actor Ralf Moeller. But I will say that the acting performances by the cast ensemble was actually fair enough.

The German language in the movie was not an issue, but why not keep a movie that is supposed to take place in Mallorca in English or Spanish? Would just have been a bit more authentic that way. And a boat with Germans in trouble in the waters at the Santoro Trench having the people do an emergency call in German just makes zero sense. Or a guy running around on a beach in Mallorca and yelling about a shark alert in German just made zero sense either.

My rating of "Hai-Alarm auf Mallorca", from director Jorgo Papavassiliou, lands on a three out of ten stars.

Still troubled by the death of his wife, a helicopter pilot feels worried about his daughter being out in the open water after a series of incidents lead him to believe that a massive killer shark is in the area, and teams up with a biologist to track down and kill the beast patrolling the waters.

Overall, this was a pretty enjoyable genre effort. Among the more enjoyable elements present here is the highly enjoyable and quite fun amount of shark action within this one. The fact that it's out rather early and is known to the one guy makes for a lot of rather fun ambush attacks to occur in the beginning as the shark takes out several tourists and other victims which are all written off as freak incidents. The main action scenes here, with the scientists out trying to capture the creature and taking the fight to it on the open water which results in a fun protracted battle with the guns on board as well as the fun race to the beach in order to rescue his daughter in the jet-ski competition, is all sorts of fun. Granted an over-the-top resolution to everything and a decent-looking shark, this works nicely. As well, the rest of the action here isn't too bad and has a lot to like. With the film going for the mixture of shark-based creature feature action and some more traditional Action film elements, there are some impressive scenes here including several rather energetic car-chases that feature some more exaggerated stunt-work than would be expected in a film like this. That carries over into the explosive finale which has some grander stunts than would be expected as well as giving the film a rather touching conclusion that ends everything on a positive note. There isn't a whole lot to dislike here but it does have some issues. One of the biggest problems here is the rather odd and somewhat disjointed pacing that takes place throughout here. Rather than build-up suspense about the series of accidents taking place slowly leading to the idea of the shark being out there, the fact that he knows immediately based on a single accident that admittedly seems out of the ordinary but has very little about it to suggest his theory would automatically be true. Likewise, the action stops in the middle of the film to deal with his romance with the scientist or trying to disprove his wild accusations which bring the focus away from the killer shark who is out and about from the very beginning. The other real issue to be had with the film is the rather obvious and continuous cliches throughout that seemed to be taken from several films and wrapped into one film. The whole concept of the prestigious scientist attempting to experiment with sharks as a means of cancer-cure research is an arc stolen completely from another film entirely, while the exploits of the scientist to rescue her imprisoned friend takes every cue possible from yet another beloved genre film. Riffs from wholesale dialog exchanges and the race to save the beach from the shark and much more are quite obviously lifted and taken from other films, leading to parts where it loses itself in these elements. Otherwise, this one isn't that bad.

Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Violence, Graphic Language and Brief Nudity.

My TV-Guide showed a big question-mark next to the film's title. They weren't able to give a comment on this film because the producing TV-channel didn't show it to journalists before its premier screening on TV. Well, they knew why...

Quite ambitious for a German TV-film with quite a budget and quite a known cast and very large marketing campaign. But the film I had to see - the try of a mixture of "Jaws" and "Jurassic Park" - was very disappointing. And the special effects - not really good - weren't the worst of all things about the film!!!

To me it seemed that the director tried to fulfill every audition's needs and so he delivered a patch work of multiple film elements, that didn't want to fit to each other. While as well "Jaws" and "Jurassic Park" were thrilling movies, in this movie every time there comes at least a small moment that might become thrilling, there is a cut and a change to a different scene, that destroys every thrill.

And in a lot of cases, the following scene is an absolute senseless filler to make the movie longer. For example there is a long dancing scene on a party - maybe to give the 14-25 year old TV-customers some Mallorca-impressions - totally senseless. Or like some kind of "product placement" a full lenght performance of the German starlet Jeanette Biedermann singing her new song on the beach....

I'd say: drop about 30 minutes of the film, take 10 minutes of new material and a very good cutter, maybe you can make at least an average film of it. Like it is by now, it's absolute waste of time watching it!

When a grieving widow (Moeller) discovers that a prehistoric shark – Megalodon – is responsible for the death of a swimmer, he suspects it might also be the same shark that killed his wife and two other divers several years earlier. Convincing newly appointed micro-biologist (Stinshoff) proves relatively easy, but she's oblivious to the grand scheme that has created the giant shark from living DNA recovered from a frozen specimen found in the Antarctic. Of all places to base a cutting edge cancer research facility, no doubt the idyllic Mediterranean tax haven of Mallorca would be the most sensible. At least that's what the makers of this film would have the audience believe.

The over-used CGI shark is typically unrealistic and so out-of-proportion and scale that it scarcely conjures any excitement or thrills. Even the shark swarm in the first scene is disappointing, once again courtesy of the CGI effects that give every attack a video-game quality. This German production's English dubbing is some of the worst (and unintentionally hilarious) you'll come across – the sight of big Ralf running down the beach shouting "Shugalum, shugalum" (that's meant to be "shark alarm, shark alarm" in Bavarian accent) a dozen times will have you in stitches. At least the producers had the foresight to anticipate the drudgery to which this would ultimately amount, and incorporated some quirky humour to lighten up the tone. There's a number of genuine laughs (as opposed to the unintentional ones) throughout, one in particular paying homage to "The Terminator" which works well. The obese BBQ chef and his bevy of scantily clad accoutrements who lends Ralf a luxury car or two is also a comic highlight.

But despite the eclectic editing, sometimes witty dialogue, postcards of Mallorca and stylish stunt-work (some great car maneuvers and helicopter acrobatics), there's little else to recommend this movie, which borrows heavily from several others of the ilk ("Deep Blue Sea" in particular), but achieves much less. Hanselmann's bikini-clad villainy is perhaps the most worthwhile aspect in this whole travesty; that or Ralf's physique, depending on your persuasion. Either way, it's not enough to entertain a second time.

RTL called this the TV Event of the year, nice Joke anyway.

The Story about a mutated shark is boring, the action is silly and unrealistic and most of the actors are really bad. Where else can you see dumba**es like Carsten Sprengeman, Simone Hanselmann, Ralph Möller, Katy Karrenbauer and Jeanette Biedermann in ONE film? They aren't even able to match their one-liners.

But what's really cool about that movie is the appearance by Ottfried Fischer: He's standing at a pool with maybe 20 Models in Bikinis. He grills there and talks about grilling and the GBA - German Barbecue Association. Whoever came up with this scene should get an award for it.

Because of this great scene I rate this movie 2/10.