“Bait 3D” is a B-film shark attack movie. Is it terrible? No. Is it great? Definitely not. But for those who want to be entertained, well, if you love these shark attack/survival films, “Bait 3D” maybe worth checking out.  For those who don’t need a deep storyline and just want to see people get killed, bodies being ripped apart and their blood and body parts coming at you via 3D, then no doubt that you may enjoy “Bait 3D”. If you are looking for a shark attack film on Blu-ray with action and humor (although possibly not intentional), then “Bait 3D” is a popcorn action/horror film worth your time!
Image courtesy of © Bait Holdings, PTY Limited. All Rights Reserved.
TITLE: Bait 3D
YEAR OF FILM: 2012
DURATION: 93 Minutes
BLU-RAY DISC INFORMATION: 1080p High Definition (1:78:1 Aspect Ratio), Dolby TrueHD 7.1, Subtitles: English SDH
COMPANY: Anchor Bay Entertainment
RATED: R (Bloody Violence/Grisly Images and Language)
RELEASE DATE: September 18, 2012
Directed by Kimble Rendall
Written by Shayne Armstrong, Duncan Kennedy, John Kim, Shane Krause, Justin Monjo, Russell Mulcahy
Produced by Peter Barber, Gary Hamilton
Executive Producer: Chris Brown, Mike Gabrawy, Ian Maycock, Ying Ye
Co-Executive Producer: Dale G. Bradley, Martin Fabinyi, Ian Gibbins, Richard Stewart, Victor Syrmis
Associate Producer: Kirsten Elms, Jeffrey Schenck
Line Producer: Sharon Miller
Music by Joe Ng, Alex Oh
Cinematography by Ross Emery
Edited by Rodrigo Balart
Casting by Matthew Lessall, Benjamin Parkinson
Production Design by Nicholas McCallum
Art Direction by Jenny O’Connell
Set Decoration by Suzy Whitefield
Costume Design by Phil Eagles
Starring:
Phoebe Tonkin as Jaimie
Julian McMahon as Doyle
Xavier Samuel as Josh
Sharni Vinson as Tina
Cariba Heine as Heather
Alex Russell as Ryan
Lincoln Lewis as Kyle
Alice Parkinson as Naomi
Richard Brancatisano as Rory
Martin Sacks as Toddy
This intense 3D thriller tells the story of a group of survivors in a sleepy beach town who suddenly find themselves trapped inside a submerged supermarket, following a freak tsunami. As they try to escape to safety, they soon discover that there is a predator among them more deadly than the threat of drowning—vicious great white sharks lurking in the water, hungry for fresh meat.
As the bloodthirsty sharks begin to pick the survivors off one by one, the group realizes that they must work together to find a way out without being eaten alive.
So, you want more shark attack films!
With Anchor Bay Entertainment’s “Jersey Shore Shark Attack” around the corner, coming out on Sept. 18th is the Blu-ray 3D/Blu-ray and DVD combo release of the Australian film,”Bait 3D”.
Featuring the directorial debut of Kimble Rendall (who worked as second unit director for “The Matrix” films, “I, Robot”, “Ghost Rider” and “Underworld: Rise of the Lycans”), “Bait 3D” stars Julian McMahon (“Nip/Tuck”, “Fantastic Four” films, “Home and Away”), Sharni Vinson (“Step Up 3D”, “Blue Crush 2”, “Home and Away”), Xavier Samuel (“The Twilight Saga: Eclipse”, “Anonymous”), Phoebe Tonkin (“The Secret Circle”, “Tomorrow, When the War Began”) and Alex Russell (“Almost Kings”).
“Bait” is a film set in a beach community and introduces us to a young couple, lifeguard Josh (portrayed by Xavier Samuel) and his fiance, Tina (portrayed by Sharni Vinson). While the two are enjoying their time together at a beach, a shark attack off-shore leads to the death of several people. With Tina’s brother, Rory, is out in the sea, Josh tries to quickly get out to sea and save him. Unfortunately, right when Josh gets there, Tina’s brother is attacked and killed by the shark.
The film then fast forwards a year later. We see how Josh has been affected by the death of Rory and his engagement to Tina is now over.  As we see him leaving home, he notices that the dogs are acting crazy and birds are behaving strangely as if they are trying to escape to another destination rather quickly.
We learn that Josh no longer is a lifeguard and works at a local grocery store as a stocker.
At this grocery store, we are then introduced to a variety of people.  We are first introduced to a troubled shoplifter named Jaimie (portrayed by Phoebe Tonkin), who steals from the local grocery store and tries to impress her boyfriend Ryan (portrayed by Alex Russell), who works in the backroom of the grocery store on the computers. Jaimie gets busted for shoplifting by the store manager (portrayed by Adrian Pang) and her father Todd (portrayed by Martin Sacks), a police officer is upset that his daughter got into trouble and is showing no remorse. Todd knows that his relationship with his daughter is strained but doesn’t know what else he can do for her and decides, maybe it’s best if he charges his daughter with a crime and so, a day in jail may make her think about committing another crime.
Meanwhile, as Josh is at work. He runs into his ex-girlfriend Tina who is accompanied by her new boyfriend, Steve (portrayed by Qi Yuwu) from Singapore.
Out in the parking lot, we are introduced to a wealthy young couple, Kyle (portrayed by Lincoln Lewis) and Heather (portrayed by Cariba Heine), who park outside the grocery store’s car port, so they can make out.  We are also introduced to Doyle (portrayed by Julian McMahon) and Kirby (portrayed by Dan Wylie) who are plotting a major robbery of the grocery store.
As the two men try to rob the bank and threaten to kill people who are inside.  A major earthquake takes place and not too long after, a tsunami hits the beach community. Inside the grocery store, many lives are lost but ten manage to survive, while a couple manage to survive submerged inside their locked car out in the car port.
Knowing that they must find a way out of the submerged grocery store, as a few try to look for an exit, the dead bodies that were once floating around the store suddenly are being pulled down. Everyone quickly learns that a killer 12 ft. great white shark is now inside the grocery store, while another great white shark is swimming inside the parking garage.
And the survivors of the tsunami stuck inside the grocery store have now become the hunted.
With the people trapped above the shelves and are trying to survive from the shark, to make things worse, aftershocks from the earthquake have now led electric wires fall from the ceiling and are dangerously close to touching the water and electrocuting everyone.
With hardly any options left, the survivors must find a way to disable the power but also stay alive as the sharks circles around the area looking for food.
VIDEO:
“Bait 3D” is presented in 1080p High Definition (1:78:1 aspect ratio). While the outdoor island scenes are gorgeous and beautiful, once the earthquake and tsunami hits, most of the shots are shot in a parking garage and one section of a grocery store. The lighting for the film is still good, character closeups feature plenty of detail. Actually, I have to say that picture quality is fantastic.
As mentioned, closeups show amazing detail from the beads of water from the characters. Despite being underground, there is a good enough light shining from the windows to the grocery store, so lighting and colors are still good. Black levels are nice and deep and I personally didn’t notice any banding issues or artifacts.
While certain scenes look very good involving the shark under and over-water, there were some inconsistency with CG. Some looking very nice and some looking as if it wasn’t rendered all that well. Especially the final few seconds of the film, which was probably a good use of 3D but picture quality-wise, it didn’t look all that great.
As for the 3D portion of the film, there are some interesting uses of 3D. One at the beginning of the film featuring Tina’s brother and a shark coming at him and throwing him up in the air, to body parts, debris, blood, birds and fish flying towards the camera. The problem is that there are not enough shock factors of 3D. There is only so much you can see of body parts and blood coming at you. Granted, being stuck in a confined space leaves your choices to a minimum but 3D is used, but its use becomes more repetitive than exciting.
AUDIO & SUBTITLES:
“Bait 3D” is presented in Dolby TrueHD 7.1. For a 7.1 lossless soundtrack, I was expecting immersiveness. Dialogue and music is crystal clear but during the action scenes, while I noticed a really good use of LFE, I was hoping to hear more directional uses of the surround and rear surround channels. I didn’t really hear too much use of the surround channels and that was a bit of a disappointment as I had high expectations because of the featured 7.1 lossless track.
Subtitles are in English SDH.
SPECIAL FEATURES:
“Bait 3D†comes with the following special features:
- Storyboard Gallery – Using your remote, you can cycle through various storyboards for the film.
EXTRAS:
“Bait 3D” comes with a Blu-ray 3D version of the film, a Blu-ray version of the film and also a DVD (presented in 1:78:1, Dolby Digital 5.1).
Let’s face it! There are people who love shark attack films or even shows that relate to sharks.
But while we have had our fair share in recent years with horror films featuring killer piranhas, snakes and other things, it’s been awhile since we had seen a horror film involving shark and here we are with the independent film, “Bait 3D”.
“Bait 3D” is an interesting shark film with a nod to B-horror flicks. Featuring stars such as Julian McMahon, Sharni Vinson and Xavier Samuel, “Bait 3D” is a predictable film and although it has its fair share of horror elements, the film combines humor, bad acting and a CG elements that looked good at times but also bad.
I enjoyed how the film started out and the story behind Josh and Tina was rather cool. I loved the idea of two lovers separated because of tragedy but to discover each other, a story could have been better created if it focused on the two. Rather than this ensemble cast which seemed to be thrown into the film primarily as shark fodder. And problem with the storyline is that with so many characters, the writers leave Josh and Tina and try to explore characters that come off as one-dimensional and not interesting at all.
For example, aside from Josh and Tina, we are introduced to another couple, Ryan and Jaimie. Ryan gets trapped with others in the parking garage, away from Jaimie, so it kind of takes away any interested of their relationship, unlike Josh and Tina as it builds throughout the film.
Also, the film tries to juggle its use of Julian McMahon’s character of Doyle. Bad guy or good guy? While he does play an important part in the film, his character could have been fleshed out more.
I understand that this is a shark film and deaths must occur, but its important for characters that you love or hate drive the emotion of the film, otherwise, no one cares and you just want to see them die a gruesome death.
While I did have problems with this film, I admit that the idea of a shark film at a grocery store, submerged after a tsunami is quite interesting. And while some scenes I saw as laughable and generic, its use of the characters made it seem so B-film, you just wonder how ridiculous their deaths will be.
You have the two Asian characters, Steven (portrayed by Qi Yuwu) and the grocery store manager (portrayed by Adrian Pang) and following the usual Hollywood-style horror script towards non-White characters, even though an Australian film, you know they are not going to live (in some ways, I was hoping this film would prove me wrong, but as most horror films go, the person of color never lives to see the day in a horror film).
Then you have two materialistic blondes stuck inside their car bickering about nonsense. These two characters were so annoying, I personally was hoping the shark would eat them.
You can tell already when you see the 12 survivors of who is going to be shark food. It’s too predictable and the writers played this film a bit too pedestrian for my taste. There were no surprising deaths, the film was effete and instead of being suspenseful, you put your hope on the veteran actor Julian McMahon or Xavier Samuel to save this film.
The 3D for the film was OK. You have big budget films that have the means to make the 3D look effective but there is only so much you can get away with body parts and fish coming towards the camera. There are a few moments where the 3D is good, but unfortunately some CG scenes don’t look that great.
The look of the film on Blu-ray was fantastic as the colors were vibrant and the film looked gorgeous. While inside the grocery store and parking garage, you are limited to the darkness and confined space. While dialogue and music were crystal clear via lossless, I was hoping a bit more immersiveness through the 7.1 lossless soundtrack. Another bummer was the lack of special features. Sure, it has a storyboard gallery but no interviews or any featurettes on the making of the film.
I did like the fact that Anchor Bay Entertainment included the Blu-ray 3D/Blu-ray and thrown in DVD with this release.
Overall, “Bait 3D” is a B-film shark attack movie. Is it terrible? No. Is it great? Definitely not. But for those who want to be entertained, well, if you love these shark attack/survival films, “Bait 3D” maybe worth checking out. It’s not that scary and the film has its fair share of problems.
But for those who don’t need a deep storyline and just want to see people get killed, bodies being ripped apart and their blood and body parts coming at you via 3D, then no doubt that you may enjoy “Bait 3D”. If you are looking for a shark attack film on Blu-ray with action and humor (although possibly not intentional), then “Bait 3D” is a popcorn action/horror film worth your time!
