Day 21: Shock Waves

Gee, it’s so hard reviewing films you haven’t seen... I’m glad Sham Shocktober comes but once a year lifetime. On the one hand, I want to find out enough about the movie in question to have something to tell you about; on the other, I don’t want to know so much that I end up spoiling it for myself. But on the other hand (which is actually my left foot disguised with a glove) there’s only ten days of Sham Shocktober left, so let’s just bite the bullet and turn to... SHOCK WAVES!

I’ve actually already seen a few scenes from Shock Waves because its director, Ken Weiderhorn, had the cheek to sneak them into his later film, Eyes of a Stranger, where they play on a TV in the background (and sometimes foreground). Eyes of a Stranger is a pretty good slasher, and a favourite at AiP due to the fact that its heroine is an Anchorwoman In Peril. The clips from Shock Waves aren’t bad, either: the movie is obviously low budget but, even in miniature doses, some of its imagery looks quite striking.

The whole “underwater zombies” theme is one that has yet to be fully exploited by the genre, and yet it makes such sense. Where else do zombies – who don’t need to breathe, remember – have such a home-field advantage over their non-shambling human counterparts? I don’t know if Shock Waves features any underwater chase scenes, but I hope it does. If not, there’s always George Romero’s next film, reputed also to feature waterlogged zombies, to look forward to...