It is Spring Break here in the Keys. What does that mean to me?
Long lines at Diner Shores, my favorite breakfast spot, for one thing. Also girls who walk in groups of six side-by-side across the bike path—MY bike path—to the beach, and no matter how many times I ring my bell or yell EXCUSE ME they don't budge to let me pass. Also boys who rent scooters that they have NO IDEA how to ride and inevitably take corners too fast and crash and have to be carted away by ambulance.
That is Spring Break in Key West.
In other parts of Florida, I hear it is different. In the made for TV movie I watched last night, SPRING BREAK SHARK ATTACK, Spring Break is VERY different than it is here. Read on if you care to know how:
Meg recaps SPRING BREAK SHARK ATTACK for your entertainment and edification:
Excellent opening montage with rich ladies in a raft getting eaten by sharks.
But sorry. Women that rich would be on a yacht, not an inflatable raft. Even I know that.
Anyway, the main character is Danielle, whose parents are making her live at home while she's going to the local college. Her high school friends who got to go away to college want her to join them in Florida for Spring Break. But Danielle's parents expect her to do Habitat for Humanity for Break, even though her brother Charlie is in that part of FL, doing marine biology stuff.
Danielle is played by Lindsay from the OC! So THAT is where she went after leaving Ryan.
Danielle's dad thinks boys are only after one thing—they're sharks. Danielle suggests her dad would know, and throws the affair he apparently had up in his face. Way to manipulate the parental units, Danielle! Awesome!
It doesn't work, though, and she has to PRETEND she's going to Habitat, when really, she joins her friends in Florida.
The headline of the local paper–Seagull Beach–reads DESPERATE SEARCH FOR MISSING HOUSEWIVES…hilarious. This is a bad TV movie with a sense of humor. You have to love that.
Spring Break at Seagull Beach includes girl Jell-O wrestling. Danielle is quick to point out the sexism of it all. Go Danielle.
We meet JT and Max, Danielle's friends' friend and boyfriend. JT and Max are the sharks Danielle's dad was talking about. JT is particularly loathsome, though toothsome, at the same time.
Danielle goes to look for Brother Charlie and meets cute Shane, the local boat renter's son. Shane can't afford college yet…but hopefully from the income his mom, owner of Mary's Ocean Charter, also the mom from 13 Going on 30, makes this Spring Break, now that the New Reef has been established, she'll be able to afford it. Danielle tells Shane about a party she'll be at later. Shane says he doesn't go to parties like that, which you know means he'll be there.
Danielle's brother Charlie looks just like Harry Potter! He is not very observant, since a GIANT shark passes right by his boat in about three feet of water and he never even notices.
Danielle's friend's Skanky Boyfriend Max goes swimming with a girl he ditched Danielle's friend for at the party. They are so going to get eaten by sharks.
Cut to Danielle talking to Shane in the bookstore next to the party (he showed up at the party, they danced one dance, then were interrupted by icky JT). Danielle shares with Shane her secret dream of being an anthropologist. Shane explains that he likes making boats go faster. Rock on, Shane. Rock on Danielle.
Skank Boyfriend Max watches as girl he met at party gets eaten, thinking she is just playing hard to get. Then something bites him too. Then they are both dead, in a cloud of blood. Awesome.
COMMERCIAL
Imitrex. I used to take Imitrex. Then I switched to Zomig. If you've ever had a migraine, you know there is no other pain like it. It is like when your little brother would stick his finger right next to your temple in the backseat of the station wagon and go, “Am I bothering you? I'm not touching you Am I bothering you? I'm not touching you. Am I bothering you? I'm not touching you. Am I bothering you? I'm not touching you. Am I bothering you? I'm not touching you. You can't tell Mom on me, because I'm not touching you,” until you want to grab his finger and break it off. Not that this ever happened to me. More than 50,000 times.
That is exactly what a migraine is like. For me.
Back to the show:
It is the next morning. Danielle has found Harry Potter. He is looking more like John Lennon this morning. Maybe a cross between Harry and John. Oh, guess what, Harry Potter has invented a shark repellant that sends out electro magnetic waves that sends sharks away. Wow, I wonder if this will come into play later in the movie!!!!
Harry Potter and Danielle discuss their bogus parental units. Then Harry warns Danielle not to go to the new reef because the tiger sharks there are out of control. They can smell blood a mile away. Danielle suggests Harry Potter is just like their dad, a big worry wart. Harry gets upset. Harry says that if he could get a girlfriend, he would never cheat on her, the way Dad cheated on Mom.
Well, OK, he doesn't really say that. But it would have been funny if he had.
Back at the beach, Danielle sees JT acting like a jerk. There is a flavored vodka sponsoring a party later, and JT invites them to attend.
Here in Key West, there are often events sponsored by alcoholic beverages. Might I add, they are overcrowded and bogus? Plus, flavored vodka gives me a migraine, which then causes me to have to take Zomig.
Shane's Mom teases him about Danielle, who came by the charter boat shop looking for him. Then his mom tells him if there's anything he ever wants to talk about, all he has to do is ask. Shane is understandably upset by this.
Meanwhile, the owner of the neighboring resort keeps borrowing Mary's boats at 5AM for unknown reasons. Could he possibly be chumming the reef to attract sharks to drive business away from Seagull Beach and towards his own resort? Wasn't this a plot on Scooby Doo once?
Huge party at Danielle's friends' aunt's house.
Note: My niece, even adorable as she is, would be dead if she did this.
At the party, Danielle's friend realizes her boyfriend Max was scamming on her. Too bad he's dead now so she can't kick his ass. Only she doesn't know he's dead yet.
Danielle finds Shane at a local beach hut. She observes that Spring Break is an interesting anthropomorphic study. JT follows her to the hut and belittles Shane. Danielle gives Shane a map to the party she'll be at, while JT slips Roofies into her soda.
I would just like to point out that this frequently happened to girls at the dorm where I worked at NYU. Girls: keep an eye on your drinks. Even sodas, like Danielle is drinking. I just read in the police beat in the paper here in Key West that the cops found some guys on the street carrying some drunk girls back to their hotel. The guys told the cops that the girls were their girlfriends.
So the cops said to the guys, “If these are your girlfriends, what are their names?” and the guys didn't know. So the cops arrested the guys and took the girls to the hospital.
Awesome.
JT carries a semi-conscious Danielle from the party. WILL SHANE GET THERE IN TIME TO HELP HER????
COMMERCIAL
I explain to my husband, who wants to know why we can't change the channel, that I am reviewing this for my blog. He rolls his eyes.
We're back. Thank God, Shane found Danielle. Or rather she wandered out onto the beach and found him. He can tell some
thing is wrong. Because she's SUPER AFFECTIONATE.
Sadly, Shane carries Danielle right back into the house where she was roofied and where JT is waiting. Shane and Danielle's friend take her to bed. Danielle admits she's starting to have feelings for Shane. Which isn't that startling of a thing for a roofied girl to admit. I mean, it could have been worse.
And then it is: Danielle speed dials Dad! She says she's sorry she lied and came to Florida. Then she passes out. Dad says, “I'm going to go down there and get her RIGHT NOW.”
Then JT creeps up the stairs to do things to an unconscious Danielle, while some girls out on a dock paddle their feet in the water. A giant shark eats one of them. Then we see JT kissing an unconscious Danielle. HE IS JUST LIKE THE SHARK. These film makers are SO SUBTLE.
Shane comes in. He sees exactly what Shane is up to. He sits down at the side of the bed to guard Danielle from more sharks. I mean, JTs.
Shot of the resort owner washing away evidence of the chum he was using to attract sharks.
Then Danielle wakes up and says she has no hangover and says she didn't drink anything, but she doesn't remember a single thing from the evening before. Her friends are immediately on to the roofie thing. The only thing Danielle remembers is calling her dad. D'OH!
JT goes to Mary's Boat Charter and belittles Shane some more. Then he says he wants to rent a boat. Shane won't let him. But his mom does. With Shane as the captain. Poor Shane.
Danielle is embarrassed to see Shane again and apologizes as she and her friends come, with JT, to take out the boat. Shane says, “It's cool.” Then Danielle's dad shows up (because you know Florida is small and it's so easy to find someone here) and Danielle says, “Stop trying to control me!” and throws the girlfriend thing up in his face. Then she leaves on Shane's boat with her friends and Shane. The friends are like, “Bye, Mr. Harrison!” as they leave.
Awesome.
Out on the boat, the girls are applying sunscreen. They have no visible cellulite. This is the most unrealistic part of the movie so far. Oh, also that they are floating past some mountainous islands that could be Catalina, which is in California, not Florida (this movie was filmed in Capetown, which is in South Africa, though, so it's not even Catalina).
JT dives in the water because Danielle won't drink and he is annoyed. Please let a shark eat him. He “hilariously” pulls Danielle into the water with him. Then her friends join them. Catalina, or whatever it is in the distance, looks lovely.
Shane sees copious amounts of blood in the water. He says, “Get out now!” Danielle is too far out to get back quickly. Sharks are surrounding her.
Commercial.
Huh, a Sea World commercial. How ironic.
Back to the show:
Shane throws Danielle a life preserver and tells her to keep still. Captain Bob told me the same thing: if a shark is coming after you, freeze. You won't sink, and sharks are attracted to movement and have bad eyesight. You'll be all right if you DON'T MOVE.
JT doesn't believe Shane and tells Danielle to swim. Danielle listens to Shane, because he is not the one who roofied her. The sharks go away. Danielle makes it back to the boat.
Now the sharks are biting the boat. The boat is flooding. Shane tells Danielle and her friends to grab whatever they can and bail. The sharks continue to eat the boat. As sharks do.
Shane tells Danielle to bring him wire clippers and wires. They appear to be hot wiring the boat. JT is frozen in fear because he is a roofie-ing jerk. They get the boat going. But they are followed by a large number of sharks. Shane says they can't make it back to the mainland, they will have to go to a nearby “island.”
In a new scene, Harry Potter finds a number of decapitated loggerhead sea turtles. They were eaten by sharks. He blames Seagull Beach for building their own reef and attracting sharks. His professor tells him not to share this belief with anyone, or he will be drummed out of the marine biology business and forced to work in Indiana.
He seriously said that. Indiana. Hee.
Meanwhile, Danielle and her friends make it to the island, which looks a lot like Martha's Vineyard. Danielle finds a packet of pills in someone's towel.
COMMERCIAL
My husband has fallen asleep. Did I mention we've had three offers on our old house? We had an open house today. We took Henrietta to the new house instead of letting her stay during the open house. She hated the new house until she found a pile of nails to lay down on. Then she was happy.
OOOOOOOH a new made for TV movie! LOCUSTS! Coming April 24! I am so there.
Back:
The friends and Shane are gathered around a campfire. Danielle is sitting off by herself. She asks JT if he has a second. He comes over, thinking he's about to get lucky. Danielle says she wants to talk about “last night,” since she doesn't remember it…which is strange because she “didn't drink.” JT tries to make out like Shane roofied that soda he gave her. Also, because Shane is the one who put her to bed.
Danielle goes to ask Shane about what happened. She explains that her dad was right: she should never have come to Spring Break. Shane says her father will never start taking her seriously until she takes herself seriously.
Danielle shows him the pills. Shane is immediately furious. He beats up JT. It is almost as good as JT getting eaten by sharks! OK, better, because it involves hot guys, fighting. Shane points out he didn't know which soda Danielle was going to get, so how could he have roofied her? All of the girls are now ostracizing JT. Danielle apologizes to Shane for doubting him.
Now would be a good time for JT to go on a nice moonlit swim, but he doesn't. Shane works on fixing the boat. He realizes someone left the bait well open and that attracted the sharks and almost sank them.
Meanwhile, Danielle's friend finds Skanky Boyfriend Max's torso on the beach. She screams and screams.
Mary at Mary's Boat Charters is dealing with Danielle's dad, explaining how odd it is for Shane to have been out overnight without calling in.
Danielle and her friends get back to Seagull Beach and Danielle runs away to tell Harry Potter about the sharks. Shane runs to tell his mom about Max and the sharks. JT can't “deal” and Danielle's friends tell him to go away because he is a roofie-ing jerk who doesn't care about his dead friend Max.
COMMERCIAL
Michael Jackson? He so did it.
Back:
Harry Potter tells Danielle to let the harbor police know about the sharks. Mary goes and yells at the resort owner (fyi, he is played by Tom Cruise's partner from the movie Cocktail. His character has obviously made some real growth since that movie).
Out on the beach, tons of Spring Breakers are partying in the water.
The harbor police won't do anything because claiming there are sharks in the water will create “utter chaos.” Harry Potter loans Danielle his binoculars and shows her that hundreds of sharks are heading towards the Spring Breakers. Harry, Shane, and Danielle decide to lead the sharks away using chum.
JT, drunk on the dock, is kissing some girl in the water. Right then, a shake eats her. This is good stuff, people. I can't believe you missed it.
The harbor police were right: Panic ensues. Spring breakers are being eaten right and left. Fountains of blood are spurting up! JT is screaming, “Shark! Shark!” God, he sucks.
So many Spring Breakers are hurry
ing for the floating raft thingie it can't possibly hold them all. Look! It's tipping! Sharks are eating surf kiters! People with big bites taken out of them are collapsing all over the beach!
It's funny how all the Spring Breakers in this movie are skinny. No overweight college kids go to Seagull Beach?
Mr. Cocktail seems to feel bad. JT is shoving girls off him as they try to save themselves. But it doesn't help. He gets eaten.
Danielle, observing all this, says, “This can't be real. This can't be happening.” She is not referring to how there isn't a single chubby Spring Breaker on the beach, either.
She appears to be talking about the sharks. She steers her chum trap towards the sharks.
My husband wakes up again and goes, “Why would the sharks eat chum when they can eat Spring Breakers?”
But it is working! They are luring the sharks away. Danielle is steering the boat. The sharks are following…just like Henrietta when I have Pounce!
Mr. Cocktail, on the beach, says, “This is all wrong. This wasn't supposed to happen.”
See what happens when you mess with Mother Nature? Also, Tom should never have left Elizabeth Shue…oh wait. Different movie.
Out at sea, the sharks are all eating the chum cage. The boat carrying Danielle, Shane, and Harry is in danger of being sunk by all the sharks. Shane tries in vain to get the boat moving. He tells Harry Potter to cut the cable. They don't do it in time! The sharks eat the boat engines (as sharks are wont to do).
COMMERCIAL
Dog food. I want a dog. I know Henrietta wouldn't like it. But it would be so fun.
Back:
Danielle's boobs got big all of a sudden. She is asking Harry Potter what they should do, since the sharks are going to run out of chum soon and start eating the boat. He is supposed to be her brother, but he keeps looking at her boobs.
Oh no! Shane got speared! Those sharks are SMART.
If you have been speared, DO NOT PULL THE SPEAR OUT the way Danielle is doing. The person could bleed to death. The spear is actually keeping the blood IN. Does no one take first aid anymore?
Harry Potter is throwing his special science project electro magnetic things over board, but he doesn't think they will work. Danielle doesn't care because she realizes she just killed her boyfriend. Now Harry Potter is saying “Pod six is down!” There is only one way to fix it. In the water.
Danielle says she'll go. She is the only one who isn't bleeding. And sharks can smell blood from a mile away, as we know. Plus, with her massive new boobies, she will float more easily than the boys.
Harry Potter gives her a crash course in fixing electro magnetic thingies. She gets it right away, because of her vast anthropology background. She goes down, nice and easy, so as not to agitate the water and attract the sharks, who are milling around. Holding her breath, she fixes Pod Six.
I had the hiccups yesterday and I tried to hold my breath to make them go away, and I did not last anywhere near as long as Danielle did.
They pull her up, and the sharks go away. Harry Potter's experiment worked!
The harbor police rescue Danielle, Harry, and Shane.
Mary of Mary's Boat Charter announces they are destroying the reef. She hopes Mr. Cocktail is happy. Danielle's dad and Mary meet the kids at the boat. Danielle thanks her dad for coming. He says, “You didn't need me.” She agrees, but says it's nice to know she has him. She doesn't say anything about the girlfriend, but you can tell she wants to.
Danielle goes up to Shane to apologize for nearly killing him with her bad first aid technique. Not really. Shane makes out like HE was scared for HER. Danielle tells him he'll never lose her, and suggests next year for Spring Break, they go to Cancun.
The end.
Oh my God. That was AWESOME. I LOVED it. Two big thumbs up.
I can't wait until 14:HOURS, the next made for TV movie, which will be on TNT April 3 and appears to be about a giant storm. Sadly I will be on book tour then, but I will try not to miss it. It's going to RULE. Maybe as much as LOCUSTS. Maybe even as much as SPRING BREAK SHARK ATTACK.
In the meantime, I am going to continue to keep an eye on our own Spring Breakers. I never thought of chumming the bike path….
More later.
Much love,
Meg
