History Film / Piranha

* ExecutiveMeddling: The reason why the second movie is as it is.

* HeyItsThatGuy: Dick Miller.
** Young MilaKunis as Paul's daughter in the TV remake.

In many respects a parody of ''Film/{{Jaws}}'', Universal Studios initially threatened to sue until Creator/StevenSpielberg saw it himself and loved it. In 1981 it got itself a sequel titled ''Piranha II: The Spawning'' in which the piranhas ''fly'' and which happens to be the directorial debut of none other than...... *drumroll* ...... [[spoiler:[[Creator/JamesCameron JAMES CAMERON!!!!!!]]]]

Well, sort of. The sequel endured massive behind-the-scenes turmoil and repeated re-edits, and how much of the above individual's work actually made it into the final project is open to debate (rumor has it that said individual at one point attempted to ''break into the studio'' either to salvage or ''destroy'' the film). Whoever is ultimately responsible, the sequel is jaw-droppingly, gut-bustingly, {{Narm}}-tastically bad; [[spoiler:Cameron]] at least has enough of a sense of humor to have said for the record that it's the [[OverlyNarrowSuperlative finest "flying piranha" movie ever made]].

Midway through the filming, the director (or at least the credited one) had a nightmare; the result of that nightmare was ''[[spoiler:TheTerminator]]''. So at least something good came out of this.

The first film was rather pointlessly remade as a [[MadeForTVMovie TV movie]] in 1995, most notable for starring a young MilaKunis and for [[StockFootage reusing footage]] from the original film.

* OldShame: ''Piranha II'' for a certain [[Creator/JamesCameron "king of the world".]]
** Yet Mr. Cameron calls it the finest "Flying Killer Fish" movie ever made.

* PropRecycling: The "flying piranha" mechanics were later reused in ''Film/{{Aliens}}'' as the moving facehuggers.

* AttackOfTheKillerWhatever

* BMovie
* CassandraTruth

* DartboardOfHate

* DeepSouth

* DistractedByTheSexy
* DrowningMySorrows

* EyeOpen

* FlyingSeaFoodSpecial

* {{Gorn}}

* HazardousWater

* TheresNoBInMovie: In the original movie some guard watches ''The Monster That Challenged the World'' from 1957.
* TotallyRadical
* WeirdMoon
* WhatTheHellHero

A more notable [[ThreeDMovie 3D]] remake, ''Film/Piranha3D'', eventually arrived in summer 2010, directed by AlexandreAja. Shifting the action to Lake Victoria and ditching the GovernmentConspiracy set-up in favour of an equally implausible plot involving prehistoric versions of the eponymous fish, it was BloodierAndGorier, HotterAndSexier and generally [[RefugeInAudacity revelled in its own silliness]]. A sequel to the remake, ''Piranha 3DD'', was released in 2012.

In many respects a parody of ''Film/{{Jaws}}'', Universal Studios initially threatened to sue until Creator/StevenSpielberg saw it himself and loved it. In 1981 it got itself a sequel titled ''Piranha II: The Spawning'' in which the piranhas ''fly'' and which happens to be the directorial debut of none other than...... *drumroll* ...... [[spoiler:[[JamesCameron JAMES CAMERON!!!!!!]]]]

* OldShame: ''Piranha II'' for a certain [[JamesCameron "king of the world".]]

* DeadStarWalking: [[spoiler:Keenan Wynn as Jack]] who appears in only two scenes before [[spoiler:his legs are devoured by the piranhas, and he bleeds to death.]]

Well, sort of. The sequel endured massive behind-the-scenes turmoil and repeated re-edits, and how much of the above individual's work actually made it into the final project is open to debate (rumor has it that said individual at one attempted to ''break into the studio'' either to salvage or ''destroy'' the film). Whoever is ultimately responsible, the sequel is jaw-droppingly, gut-bustingly, {{Narm}}-tastically bad; [[spoiler:Cameron]] at least has enough of a sense of humor to have said for the record that it's the [[OverlyNarrowSuperlative finest "flying piranha" movie ever made]].

A more notable [[ThreeDMovie 3D]] remake eventually arrived in summer 2010, directed by AlexandreAja. Shifting the action to Lake Victoria and ditching the GovernmentConspiracy set-up in favour of an equally implausible plot involving prehistoric versions of the eponymous fish, it was BloodierAndGorier, HotterAndSexier and generally [[RefugeInAudacity revelled in its own silliness]]. A sequel to the remake, ''Film/{{Piranha}} 3DD'', is set to be released in 2012.

* ActorAllusion: A trailer for 3DD shows Creator/DavidHasselhoff state [[{{Baywatch}} that he's never been a lifeguard]].

* HotterAndSexier: ''Piranha [[BuxomIsBetter 3DD]]''

* PropRecycling: The "flying piranha" mechanics were later reused in {{Aliens}} as the moving facehuggers.

* InfantImmortality: Averted ''hard''.

Two teens break into an abandoned facility to engage in a spot of skinnydipping in the reservior, and are promptly pulled under and torn to shreds. The next day, insurance investigator Maggie Mc Keown (Heather Menzies) is dispatched to find them. Teaming up with local hillbilly Paul Grogan (Bradford Dillman), the two enter the facility themselves and inadvertedly drain the critters engineered by resident mad scientist Dr. Robert Hoak (Kevin Mc Carthy) as part of the now-defunct operation Razorteeth ([[VietnamWar in which they would be unleashed into the riverways of North Vietnam]]) into the river; wherein they make themselves en route to a nearby summer camp where Grogan's daughter is staying, and ultimately the ocean...

* ActorAllusion: A trailer for 3DD shows DavidHasselhoff state [[{{Baywatch}} that he's never been a lifeguard]].

In many respects a parody of ''Film/{{Jaws}}'', Universal Studios initially threatened to sue until StevenSpielberg saw it himself and loved it. In 1981 it got itself a sequel titled ''Piranha II: The Spawning'' in which the piranhas ''fly'' and which happens to be the directorial debut of none other than...... *drumroll* ...... [[spoiler:[[JamesCameron JAMES CAMERON!!!!!!]]]]

Well, sort of. The sequel endured massive behind-the-scenes turmoil and repeated re-edits, and how much of the above individual's work actually made it into the final project is open to debate (rumor has it that said individual at one attempted to ''break into the studio'' either to salvage or ''destroy'' the film). Whoever is ultimately responsible, the sequel is jaw-droppingly, gut-bustingly, [[{{Narm}} narm]]-tastically bad; [[spoiler:Cameron]] at least has enough of a sense of humor to have said for the record that it's the [[OverlyNarrowSuperlative finest "flying piranha" movie ever made]].

A more notable [[ThreeDMovie 3D]] remake eventually arrived in summer 2010, directed by AlexandreAja. Shifting the action to Lake Victoria and ditching the GovernmentConspiracy set-up in favour of an equally implausible plot involving prehistoric versions of the eponymous fish, it was BloodierAndGorier, HotterAndSexier and generally [[RefugeInAudacity revelled in its own silliness]]. A sequel to the remake, ''{{Film/Piranha}} 3DD'', is set to be released in 2012.

''This entry is for the original 1978 movie and it's sequels. For the 2010 remake and it's sequel see here: Film/Piranha3D''

'''''Piranha''''' is a 1978 [[BMovie B]] comedy-horror film, directed by JoeDante and written by director-to-be JohnSayles, about a swarm of [[AttackOfTheKillerWhatever genetically-engineered killer piranhas]].

[[caption-width-right:300:Totally [[Film/{{Jaws}} original]] [[SuspiciouslySimilarSubstitue poster]], [[BlatantLies we swear]]!]]

[[caption-width-right:300:Totally [[Film/{{Jaws}} original]] poster, [[BlatantLies we swear]]!]]

[[caption-width-right:300:Totally [[{{Jaws}} original]] poster, [[BlatantLies we swear]]!]]

In many respects a parody of ''{{Jaws}}'', Universal Studios initially threatened to sue until StevenSpielberg saw it himself and loved it. In 1981 it got itself a sequel titled ''Piranha II: The Spawning'' in which the piranhas ''fly'' and which happens to be the directorial debut of none other than...... *drumroll* ...... [[spoiler:[[JamesCameron JAMES CAMERON!!!!!!]]]]

Well, sort of. The sequel endured massive behind-the-scenes turmoil and repeated re-edits, and how much of the above individual's work actually made it into the final project is open to debate. Whoever is ultimately responsible, the sequel is jaw-droppingly, gut-bustingly, [[{{Narm}} narm]]-tastically bad; [[spoiler:Cameron]] at least has enough of a sense of humor to have said for the record that it's the [[OverlyNarrowSuperlative finest "flying piranha" movie ever made]].

'''Piranha 3D''' is a remake of the original JoeDante B-movie, directed by AlexandreAja.

Set at Lake Victoria, a minor earthquake opens up a chasm that connects the lake to a larger subterranean one. The local sheriff (Elizabeth Shue) escorts a trio of scientists to explore the underwater cave, while her chief deputy (Ving Rhames) is left to oversee the chaos of Spring Break. However, thousands of prehistoric piranha that have outlived their species' extinction by millions of years are now able to escape to the surface, eating two of the scientists, and then making their way towards the town's very active beach.

Also filling out the adult cast are Jerry O'Connell (a Girls Gone Wild-esque producer/director), ChristopherLloyd (a marine biologist), and [[TheCameo Richard Dreyfus]] ([[spoiler: [[DeathByCameo a local fisherman who is the first to get eaten]] ]]). As increulous as it may seem, the film actually got mostly ''positive'' reviews, for being realistically scary, but also knowing when to indulge in it's BMovie roots. One year later, a sequel was announced. At the 2011 Spike TV Scream Awards, the trailer for '''Piranha 3DD''' premiered. Lloyd, Rhames, and Paul Scheer (O'Connell's cameraman) will reprise their roles. [[TheVampireDiaries Danielle Panabaker]] will play the lead.

!!The 2010 3D film provides examples of:

* ActionMom: The sheriff. [[MamaBear She shows no hesitation to go help her kids when they're in danger.]]
* ActorAllusion: Richard Dreyfus appears in a film about an aquatic threat, plays a character called Matt and sings along to "Show Me The Way To Go Home". The credits make it clear that he is playing a different character though, with the surname Boyd rather than [[{{Jaws}} Hooper]].
* AssholeVictim: The spring-break jerks. Every. One. Of. Them.
** Jerry O'Connell's character deserves special mention, though.

* AttackOfTheTownFestival: Actually spring break, but close enough.
* BadAss: Ving Rhames as Deputy Fallon
* BeyondTheImpossible: The beach scene. INSANE.

* BloodierAndGorier: Ramps this up to ridiculous levels, and it's obviously intentional.
* BloodyHilarious: Some of the deaths, such as the DiagonalCut scene and the girl who, while being carried to shore by two guys, turns out to be more injured than they thought, as the one holding her legs [[MadeOfPlasticine accidentally rips]] the bottom half of her torso off.
* CassandraTruth: The police warn the partygoers to get out of the water, but nobody listens until the blood starts spilling.
* ChekhovsGun: [[spoiler: The propane tanks]]
* ConspicuousCGI: Joe Dante's advice to Alexandra Aja, the director of the 2010 version, was "even if you're doing the fish in CGI, use puppets". It's very easy to tell which piranha is CG and which fish is a physical prop.
* CruelAndUnusualDeath: Lots and lots of this, including non-piranha caused deaths: a girl gets sliced in half by a high tension wire and watches her bikini top fall off before [[DiagonalCut the rest of her upper torso follows suit.]] Another girl's hair gets tangled in the propellers of a speedboat, ripping off her scalp and face. The host of a Wet T-shirt contest is decapitated. In more piranha-related news, a piranha eats a woman from the inside out, emerging from her mouth. Two piranhas fight over the severed penis of a pornographer.
** The piranhas didn't like it.
* DeadStarWalking: [[spoiler: [[TheCameo Richard Dreyfuss]]]].
* DeathBySex: promiscuous spring-breakers, a pornographer, and wet t-shirt contest host ([[DeathByCameo played by]] EliRoth) are on the receiving end of the piranhas' teeth.
* DiabolusExMachina: Although the ending wasn't really candy and rainbows, it was revealed that [[spoiler: the piranhas throughout the movie were actually babies, and an adult piranha eats one of the protagonists.]]

* DistressedDamsel: Kelly.
* FanDisservice: Many very beautiful people are killed in ways that combine sex and gory violence, for example the girl who gets sliced in half by a high-tension wire as mentioned earlier: first the bikini top falls off, exposing her breasts...then the rest of her upper torso follows suit.
** Jerry O'Connell's severed penis. That is all.
* FanService: Lots, particularly the underwater nude ballet between Kelly Brooke and Riley Steele. Yum.
* FictionalCounterpart: The plot revolves around a Wild Wild Girls production/event, an obvious parody of Girls Gone Wild.

* HeroicSacrifice: See [[YMMV/{{Piranha}} Crowning Moment of Awesome]].
* HeyItsThatGuy: EliRoth as the wet t-shirt contest host in the 3D remake.
** Who else wanted to hear Christopher Lloyd's character exclaim [[BackToTheFuture "Great Scot!"]]?
** A couple of porn starlets show up in cameo roles. You, uh, might have preferred [[DeathByCameo not knowing that.]]
** Kelly Brook. Unknown in the States, but a household name in Britain.
** Popular pornstar Gianna Michaels is the parasailing girl.
* HorrorDoesntSettleForSimpleTuesday: Spring Break.
* HookerWithAHeartOfGold: A porn actress rather than a hooker, but Kelly Brook's character is otherwise this to a tee. She quickly becomes a sort of surrogate CoolBigSis to the teenage hero, [[ShipperOnDeck tries to get him to kiss the girl he has a crush on]] and is the only character to show grief when [[spoiler: the {{Jerkass}} porn producer dies. Not that any of this stops her becoming fish food of course.]]
* HotterAndSexier: Lots of nudity, including the aforementioned nude ballet.
* ImprovisedWeapon: Ving Rhames' character runs out of ammo, so he takes the motor off of a boat and uses it to chop piranhas up like a blender.
* InfantImmortality: Curiously played straight, unlike the original.
* LargeHam: ChristopherLloyd, of course. Jerry O'Connell also gets really into his role, to hilarious effect.
* MadeOfPlasticine: Some of the results of the attacks look like this, particularly the girl who's accidentally pulled in half while being carried to shore.
* MoodWhiplash: Goes from goofy 'teens on a porn set' scene, to standard horror movie stuff that could still pass for goofy/comedic, to a several-minute scene of unusually realistic gore. This troper was unnerved not by the gore, but by the sudden shift in tone.
** Especially the aftermath of the lake massacre where the survivors are being pulled out of the river.
* NoCelebritiesWereHarmed: Averted. Jerry O'Connell said that his character was explicitly based on Girls Gone Wild found Joe Francis, and insisted on giving him the goriest death in the movie.
* NudeNatureDance: The underwater ballet scene.
* OhCrap: [[spoiler: They're the ''babies'']]

* RefugeInAudacity: Good lord.
* SmugSnake: Not really a villain, but audiences just love to hate Derrick Jones' manic douchiness.
* TooDumbToLive: Almost everybody.
* {{Third Is 3D}}: The marketing title ''Piranha 3D'' is somewhat confusing, making it look like the film might be a second sequel rather than another reworking.
** It is the second remake, making it technically the third Piranha, just not a sequel to Piranha 2.
* TrailersAlwaysSpoil: An annoying example. That scene in the trailers where [[spoiler: a giant piranha leaps out of the water, and snatches a character off the boat?]] ''That's the ending.''
* UnderwaterKiss: It's an underwater ''[[{{Fanservice}} nude]] [[UpToEleven ballet]]'', as mentioned several times above.
* WhatCouldHaveBeen: The Bluray reveals two abandoned sequences storyboarded that are even more over the top than some of the Piranha attack sequences in the movie.
* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: Cameraman Andrew vanishes without trace three quarters of the way through the movie. It can be safely assumed he was eaten by piranha but it's weird we never see his fate considering all the other victims on the same boat get very graphic and obvious deaths.
** WordofGod says he was to fall off the boat and swim towards shore only to have his nose bitten off by a piranha. The scene apparently ended up being cut due to being a special effects headache and all that remains in the finished film is a *very* brief shot of Andrew falling overboard when the boat hits the rocks.
* YouFailGeologyForever: The fish are released after a tectonic plate shift exposes their breeding ground to the rest of Lake Victoria. Dubious at best.
* YouFailBiologyForever: A lot of the gore is exaggerated for the sake of, well, exaggeration. Also, piranha, even prehistoric piranha, probably wouldn't have behaved or looked as vicious. In fact, normal piranha look a lot like normal fish when their mouths are closed.
** They've spent millions of years in an isolated cave with nothing to eat but each other. That most likely affected their evolution making them extremely more aggressive and efficient killers. Now, the realistic science of a self-contained environment centered on cannibalism is another thing entirely. But hey, RuleOfCool.
*** Considering how scary a lot of prehistoric fish looked (''Dunkleosteus'' as a good example, and the various prehistoric sharks like ''Helicoprion''), prehistoric piranhas may have looked rather fearsome... if piranha weren't a more recently-evolved line of fish.
*** Although the prehistoric aspectic is pure fail, the effects of food scarcity on piranha is based on what happens to populations of piranha trapped in isolated lakes during the dry season. These piranha trapped in impoverished environments devour everything in the lake, then begin to attack eachother at the slightlest sign of weakness. Even large animals like humans that the fish would not dare attack, become fair game as they starve. This is the source of the legends of "killer" piranha. [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_H0XGhz8GE&feature=related]]
** In such a cave, completely cut off from the surface, how exactly did the fish get access to oxygen?
*** An underwater aquifer could supply an ongoing source of fresh oxygenated water.

!!The (trailer for the) sequel ''Piranha 3DD'' contains examples of:
* AsHimself: DavidHasselhoff
* IGotBetter: [[spoiler: Deputy Fallon, who presumably died making a HeroicSacrifice, is at the grand opening of the water park in a wheelchair.]] However, once the piranha show up...
** HandicappedBadass: [[spoiler: Rather than prosthetics, he attaches modified '''[[PlanetTerror SHOTGUNS]]''' to them!]]
--->''[[PreAssKickingOneLiner Bring me my legs...]]''
* HotterAndSexier: ''3[[IncrediblyLamePun DD]]'' [[BeyondTheImpossible somehow intends to take the first film]] UpToEleven.

** OrIsIt?

* [[{{ptitleksd3bfc6}} Horror Doesn't Settle For Simple Tuesday]]: Spring Break.

Also filling out the adult cast are Jerry O'Connell (a Girls Gone Wild-esque producer/director), ChristopherLloyd (a marine biologist), and [[TheCameo Richard Dreyfus]] ([[spoiler: [[DeathByCameo a local fisherman who is the first to get eaten]] ]]). As increulous as it may seem, the film actually got mostly ''positive'' reviews, for being realistically scary, but also knowing when to indulge in it's BMovie roots. One year later, a sequel was announced. The basic plot is that the survinv piranha have escaped through the town's plumbing system, and have made their way to popular waterpark. At the 2011 Spike TV Scream Awards, the trailer for '''Piranha 3DD''' premiered. Lloyd, Rhames, and Paul Scheer (O'Connell's cameraman) will reprise their roles. [[TheVampireDiaries Danielle Panabaker]] will play the lead.