60 Nights of Horror #10: Piranha 2: The Spawning
I went through all of finals week losing sleep to watch these movies and I took a lot of notes, but I never wrote any essays. And that’s too damn bad, because in the moment, the notes I took were funny!
These are my unedited notes on 1981’s Piranha 2: The Spawning directed by first timer James Cameron.
Yes, that James Cameron.
From moment one we are introduced to badly dubbed Baby (not) Carrie Fisher and Papa John of Papa John’s Pizza attempting and failing to have sex in a boat. It’s hard to have sex in a boat, so it’s scuba time.
Now once upon a time I had quite a bit of scuba sex in a very deep saltwater swimming pool (and those videos are out there in the ether, good luck finding them because I used a fake name and didn’t have any tattoos then), and I gotta say that these kids had to have planned ahead of time to be scuba diving because their boat just happens to be directly above a popular shipwreck. So I’m guessing they were out there under the pretense of scuba diving and then decided “well, we ARE alone” before they decided a dinghy was the best place to get the motion in their ocean. I wouldn’t know, because there is no dialogue in this underwater scene. There is a bit of romance, as there is only one tank between them (maybe they DIDN’T plan this in advance) and they’re exchanging the mouthpiece to breathe in between kisses.
This is terribly impractical if you want to have an orgasm. At least in my experience, it’s important to be able to breathe together, and not be fumbling around trying not to get tetanus from this rusty ass schooner at the bottom of the sea while you’re trying to brace yourself enough to get a good grind. Not a problem for these two, because MOVIES!
Speaking of movies, aside from the awkward and impractical fucking, this scene is heavily influenced by the “Ben Gardner’s” boat sequence in Jaws.
These opening credits are the bomb. The name Ovidio di Assonitis is going to haunt my dreams, and it’s a pleasure to see that this was largely an Italian production. Steve Powder did the music, it’s very romantic.
…. And Lance Henriksen as “Steve”
Is that Jeremy Strong or John Turturro or a young Eric Bogosian? This guy has a look.
Okay so there is a teen boy waving a fish in his girlfriend’s face.
She might be his sister. Or his mom.
She’s his mom.
Mom.
They’re almost kissing.
Mom.
Guys. Guys. Guys. Mom. Son. Guys.
Good god thank fuck the scene broke and took us to the beach, that was tense. Erotic and playful, maybe just tense for me because it was so erotic and playful. They may be playing mother and son, but if that woman didn’t Patrick Dempsey that little boy I’ll eat my hat, cause they FUCKIN.
Highlights from the beach:
Horny Nonna trying to bang the young waiter: “You know what the doctors say killed my last husband? Excitement.”
The Italian tourists pretending to be American tourists by talking about everything that was included with the package including the coupons and vouchers for future touristy shit, it’s like they really don’t care about what they’re entitled to but they’re roleplaying as people who would care. They’re super kinky, doing that hot new fetish called “normaling.”
The father and son fishing with dynamite. Dynamite fishing? More like dynamite foreshadowing! Momma didn’t raise no fool, and Lance Henriksen’s Chief Brody- I mean “Steve” can’t tell these two how to live.
The shot for shot recreation of the meet-cute in Liza Minnelli's Ring Them Bells (from her award winning special Liza with a Z, which aired 10 Sept 1972, so happy 50 years to Liza with a Z! I didn’t realize we were celebrating by watching Piranha 2 but baby Jim Cameron saw your special, he had to, and he said these two, Norm Sapperstein and Shirl Devore, need to be in my movie.)
Ah, so NOT Sigourney Weaver a.k.a. Anne, sans teenage lover-son, is a scuba diving instructor, and warns us of the mating rituals of the special kind of grunion that spends the first full moon after the spring equinox FUCKIN like mothers and sons. As in, we should think about closing the beaches cause grunions are mean.
Penthouse Pets Carole Davis and Connie Lynn Hadden are tannin these tiddies! Gorgeous gorgeous girls using their feminine wiles to sail from island to island, do hotgirl shit, and get what they want! I want a whole movie about these con artist hotgirl pirates.
Teen boy does boat tours. 10-4. OHHHHH Lance Henriksen as “Steve” is his dad. Hey Lance Henriksen as “Steve,” ya boy is standing a little too close to your ex-wife. Who just called you fat. Like… how toxic was 1980 that Lance Henriksen as “Steve” needed to be reminded that he’d packed on a few? Ohhh shit he’s 5’11” and pushing 130, the fat fuck. That’s it, I don’t like Anne.
We’re going to the popular shipwreck ohhh shit the movie is moving!
Smarmy “did you go to asshole school” tourist likes Anne. That’s fine.
“Do you dive on the first date?” SMOOTH.
More like asshole school of FISH, am I right??
WE GOT AN UPSHORTS SHOT! I SEEN THE SAC! CHECKMATE ATHEISTS!
I like that the eyes of this dead boy are still intact behind the mask since it’s only been a few hours. but the rest of this body should be way more eaten if we’re dealing with piranhas. Grunions. Murder grunions.
Okay so she wants to be way too involved for someone who is NOT an investigator. Babe no, you are in the wrong, and you are tampering with evidence.
Smarmy tourist: “How are we supposed to have a love affair if you keep walking away from me?”
Like bro if she’s not interested, she’s not interested. You know who’d DTF more than anyone on this island? Horny Nonna. Go give her some of that young buck dick, she is specifically seeking no-strings encounters are you are remiss if you don’t wanna find out what really killed her first husband.
Oh don’t break into the morgue. And DON’T have the entrance to the morgue on the fucking street! I know we’re in like Haiti or whatever but damn, there should be more than one door separating the morgue from any regular jagoff who can slide a hotel keycard into a door jamb. Disrespectful.
We’ve got Anne on: breaking Lance Henriksen as “Steve’s” heart, breaking and entering, tampering with evidence, improper handling of a corpse, violation of medical privacy (even though HIPAA didn’t go into effect til 1996 but who’s counting? Oh yeah, ME) but they ARE in the Caribbean, laws are probably different -A PIRANHA INSIDE THE BODY HOW HAS IT BEEN ALIVE THIS LONG WHY IS IT SO BIG AND WHY THE FUCKING FUCK CAN IT FLY?!! IS THIS A GRUNION?!!
how horny is this smarmy tourist that he’s still following anne around?
Okay let’s talk about fish. That wasn’t a grunion. But it was like a grunion. Perhaps a piranha-grunion-flying fish hybrid? Oh this is tiresome, let’s fuck. But we wouldn’t have to make love or anything. Make love? Oh, Anne, that’s furthest thing from my mind. NOBODY HERE SAYS WHAT THEY MEAN.
Meanwhile back on the tiddy boat…
Nope. I hate these floppy fish sounds. I hate the sound of flapping wings. I hate when a bird flies near me, I hate when a fish swims between my legs, this is bad. Console my discomfort with some sweet 80s hips in French cut bikini, that’s right girl, show me why you were Penthouse Pet of the Month in January 1980, Carole Davis posing under the name Tamara Kapitas. NOOOOOOO these fish are flapping, I hate it, this is scary, not the Cocktease Twins, they don’t deserve this! This is not the Cherry-Coloured Fuck I asked for! This isn’t Heaven OR Las Vegas! It’s flying fish from hell!
And Lance Henriksen as “Steve.”
Annie got laaaaaaaid and now her ex husband is all pissy. (Wait’ll her son finds out.) Nobody owns you, Anne. Never forget that. Though it is super fucked that you got fired for bringing up the safety issues inherent with trying to lead scuba tours in piranha-grunion flying-fish infested waters. No, you shouldn’t have gotten fired for trying to keep guests safe. But you SHOULD have been arrested for breaking into the morgue and fucking with dead bodies and opening a drawer that led to a nurse being killed by an escaped murder fish. Yes, that death is 100% on YOU, Anne.
And the smarmy tourist? He’s a government spy! Trying to get a specimen of the fish his agency has suspected the army of breeding for…. war?? Grunions who can live out of water and fly? And are… HUGE? How big is a normal grunion and also the FUCKING HUBRIS of the army to try to not only breed these things but conceive of controlling them?!
Jim Cameron would do this very scene. This same fucking scene. He would do it again in Aliens. And then again in Terminator 2. Annie are you going to blow these fish outta the goddamn airlock? The bastards can fly!
goddamn these tourist girls got sum tiddies
This father cradling his dead son and crying just really uh… changed the whole tone of the film.
Okay, so at some point offscreen Lance Henriksen as “Steve” as Chief Brody browbeat an army colonel to admit to breeding flying murder fish. Being that this scene does not appear in this film, I’m imagining Powers Boothe as Colonel Sanders as the army colonel. I’m sad this scene doesn’t exist, I would have loved to have seen it. JIM.
And then this grieving father declared a jihad upon all the fish in the sea and set the dynamite timer to go off at dawn. Bro how much dynamite do you have?
Horny Nonna coming through with the champagne and oysters
Oh dear, the resort boss is starting a riot, the spawning is not a tourist attraction, but now apparently this massive spectacle will end in blood! The flying fish are fucking up these tourists something fierce and there is not one person in the swimming pool, shitfaced on a floating chair, yelling “Flying fish? Ion give a flying FUCK!” And that’s how you can tell this wasn’t made at the Wyndham Orlando.
These fish are only eating bits of faces and lil bites of necks and arms, and that’s disappointing.
And where am I gonna throw this dynamite? I get that he’s grieving, but this dad isn’t even screaming or yelling, he’s just letting these fish gently eat him, no explosions? I call boognish. There’s no wrong way to grieve but if this is your idea of a jihad, I call boognish.
Meanwhile Miss Teen Tiddies Caribbean 1980 (and Chris the Motherfucker) stranded on a dinghy, words cannot describe the trouble they’re in.
But the music is so beautifully dramatic!
Ballsy to swim into the wreck barelegged like that, when lightweight chainmail shark-safe suits had been invented and in use for years at that point. I thought this resort was nice, I thought it was a nice place.
Do you think that if you put the dynamite in the shipwreck, you’re gonna…. kill the entire school of flying murder fish? Sure Jan.
Here they come, straight outta asshole school.
Anne and the Smarmy Spy swimming thru the ducts while the fish try to get at them through the vents if some real Deep Blue Sea meets Jaws 3 vibes, sans any helpful dolphins.
I hadn’t really noticed up to this point, but this entire movie has been an ad for Texas Instruments.
SURE LANCE HENRIKSEN AS “STEVE,” LET’S CRASH A PERFECTLY GOOD HELICOPTER FOR NO DAMN REASON.
The murder fish are in the vents! Oh boy, we might be getting a Jaws ending.
You know, not once has anyone been told to get inside or stay inside til now, and that could have solved a lot of problems. Saved a lot of lives. Just like, stay inside. It’s raining death, just stay inside.
Aw man, not the smarmy government spy who helped Anne get her groove back, god I hate the sound these fish make. Well bro that’s what you get, you could have been investigating sex crimes but no, you wanna take down the army scientists. Well…… you never really stood a chance here.
Anne made it out of the explosion by grabbing the anchor of the dive boat thank fuck, sorry about the bio engineer army crimes investigator but dynamite fishing amirite??
But are all the murderfish dead?
Bf pointed out that so many movies in the 80s had a subplot of parents almost getting divorced and then getting back together after a bunch of shit happens. It’s true, but that’s called trauma bonding. Resist the urge to text your ex, no matter how good the music is.