In Alpine Lake, Nevada, two sheriff's deputies go to a house on the lake and find numerous animals, and a cute 3-year-old girl. The cops chase Clint, who is in a van, and he is sent to prison. There is no one to pick up Carly, so she will go to Child Services.Five years later, Meredith, one of the deputies that discovered Carly, is the girl's mother. Apparently she adopted the girl, but the details are never mentioned. Carly isn't quite as cute any more, but she is cute later, in an edgy way. Meredith is such a good mother, and she really cares about Carly. And her mother is there to help. Clint is out of prison and wants visitation. Meredith has no intention of letting that happen. Also, Don's goons visit Clint at his lake house demanding that he come back to work. Despite having guns, the goons get the same treatment as Rocky Balboa.People are having fun at the beach, including girls in bikinis. An underwater camera shows ... nothing at this point but there is ominous music.Christopher and his wife are retired and in a more isolated area. Christopher goes in the lake to pan for gold while his wife goes back for a camera. Underwater camera, ominous music, oh, NOOOOO ...The sign says bears are active, so the conclusion is that it was a bear attack. Meredith doubts this, and so does Peter, a fish expert who just happens to be in the community for a study, and hears about the controversy in a restaurant. He begins investigating.Hunters are going after the bear, and yes, we do see one.But one night there is a bachelorette party at the lake. The camera operators make certain we get a good look at the bikinis. One girl whose bikini is so revealing her rear end has to be blurred on broadcast TV goes in the water with a guy. Underwater camera, ominous music ...Peter makes a terrible discovery. Given the title of the movie, we know what it really is, right? But where did it come from? I think we know that too. And just in case you don't, Don himself shows up at Clint's place with even more goons and guns this time, and demands what is rightfully his.A colorful BBC TV host named Garreth shows up and wants to make the capture or killing of the animal into one of his TV episodes, complete with interviews and exciting narration. The girl from the bachelorette party is asked some questions, and she's quite a character too, though not much in the brains department. Also, she's wearing more. Several plot lines go together to give us some adventure and deliver an exciting climax. Peter and Meredith work together and even show signs of a possible romance. I need to point out a mistake in the listing that came with my TiVo. Meredith is not working with her husband. She is single. I mention this since you might have seen the same mistake somewhere. This is a pretty standard horror/thriller, and not really scary if that's what you're looking for. Not that bloody either, at least when cleaned up for broadcast TV. There is a lot of red water, but not gore, and not that many views of the dangerous animal until later. This movie relies a lot on suspense; you think something is about to happen but don't always get rewarded.Dolph Lundgren does a surprisingly good job in one scene where Clint shows just how much he loves Carly. He's not consistently talented but does a good enough job. We get to laugh a few times, especially at Garreth. It's a shame he had to give up on his quest more quickly than we would have liked. Miles Doleac is a real standout here. Sara Lane does okay as Meredith, particularly when she is a mother, but she's not great. She does have a mouth on her as a lot of her words had to be bleeped.Lance Nichols is quite good as the sheriff.Lily Brooks O'Briant may have a future. She's pretty good as young Carly. Matalin Rayborn has a couple of scenes of even younger Carly and she's just adorable. I don't think she speaks but she does smile a lot. If you are the age Carly is in most of the movie, Iu don't really recommend this unless it's cleaned up for broadcast as it was for me, and even then I'd be cautious. But the V-chip rating was TV-PG with L and V. In "Jaws" they say, "You're gonna need a bigger boat." In this movie, "You're gonna need a boat." and "That's not big enough." I think this gives you an idea of how the two movies compare.It's not a classic, or even bad enough to be good, but it's not bad.

Swimmers and land-lovers begin to become part of the food chain In a quiet town on Lake Tahoe. After Legendary (2013) Dolph Lundgren returns to another creature features themed film in this slightly better than a Syfy feature thanks to some murky CGI. Lundgren with limited screen time plays a black-market exotic species dealer named Clint, I kid you not.With a setting reminiscent of Lake Placid, there's plenty of fake blood, CGI and attacks in two feet of water. It warms up slightly in the last twenty minutes and as the water gets deeper, but don't go expecting Jaws or The Reef, as Dolph and company thump their way to survival. It's played straight and the actors do there best, notable is the young actress Lily Brooks O'Briant and Sara Malakul Lane as cop Meredith Hendricks.To director Jerry Dugan's credit the fantastic location gives it some atmosphere and the night-time scenes hide much of the production's low budge short comings. With an air of seriousness it's better than the endless amount of CGI shark versus... fill in the blank, or spoofs doing the rounds. Its not good or memorable enough to achieve cult status, a lot of effort has gone into this but it's probably no coincidence they're hunting a Bullshark.

It's not the worst movie ever made, but it may feature the worst CGI ever. At least movies like Sharknado don't take themselves seriously, and for that reason, they succeed in being entertaining at least.Shark Lakes budget clearly went into paying Dolph Lundgren and while he's not exactly known for his acting abilities, this is probably the worst movie he has ever appeared in.This movie has no humor, no likable characters and when you see the shark you will most likely want to turn off like I did. There is no reason to watch this movie, ever!Do yourself a solid and just watch Jaws again if your looking for your shark fix!

You have to appreciate Dolph Lundgren's tenacity to make movies, he churns out robust quantity of them in last year alone. Unfortunately, in Shark Lake he seems like just a famous name slapped into the title and poster, while being almost completely isolated from the main plot. The movie itself is appealingly bad, this is the level of sloppy presentation equal to random death scene in telenovela with silly fake shark fin, which admittedly surprising to see outside cartoon.It all goes down in a formulaic monster movie plot, if you haven't predicted it already, there's a lake and shark on it. Cue the montage of silly party girls, stupid death scenes, incompetent authority figure, but wait, it has Dolph Lundgren. However, he's more of a subplot, separated from the rest. It's almost like an average action portion glued to a monster movie.This is pretty disappointing since the best spark the movie has is the simple family drama. No one would form connection to plastic shark, but audience may relate to Dolph Lundgren as the ex-con trying to bond with her estranged little daughter. It is the closest to sincerity on this movie, yet it occurs too little too late.Concerning the actual threat, it's undeniably horrible. The visual is incredibly bad, using cheap editing, poor animation effect and actual fake shark fin. The corpse of mechanical Jaws rolls on its watery grave. One can even see the drop in quality when transitioning from day to night. It looks so fake that it would've worked as parody, yet the movie insists on the gritty dark look, it's a bit sad really.Shark Lake is, by no intention of itself, a parody of Jaws. The brief appearance from Dolph Lundgren can't save it and merely serves as timid advertisement.