In honor of our first annual Shark Week celebration, it was time to give the greatest line we've ever heard in a film on this site its place in the DTVC Hall of Fame. The world of DTV films are known for their great lines, so for one to be considered the best, it has to be special. But beyond that great line, this film is a fun time in its own right.
Shark Attack 3: The Megalodon features John Barrowman as boat guy in Mexico whose business is disrupted by a big shark. Enter Jenny McShane, a paleontologist with knowledge of the situation. With a big celebration coming and no plans to close the beaches, it's up to Barrowman and McShane to stop the shark before too many people die. As you can imagine, that kind of tension can bring two people together romantically.
It's before the love scene between Barrowman and McShane that the famous line happens, in that shot above. "I'm really wired... what do you say I take you home and eat your pussy?" And with that cinematic history--forget DTV history, cinematic history--was made. It has all the makings of a great movie line: out of nowhere and unexpected, something off about it, and something you never hear people say in movies ever. Beyond that you have Barrowman, someone whose talent is already outclassing the material and elevating this to something beyond simply a shark attack movie, delivering the line as perfectly as you'd need; and Jenny McShane has pretty much no reaction, after which we immediately cut to the standard lovemaking scene.
According to IMDb, Barrowman was told to say something to make McShane laugh, and the scene was never intended to be in the final cut. Without it, this is simply another shark movie, only with the novelty of having Barrowman in it. With it, the film becomes a classic. But it should also be noted that this was better than your average shark movie without the line. It's played just straight enough that you don't know if it's in on the joke, which gives it a quality where we can riff on it with our friends for a group movie night, while at others it allows us to laugh along with it. It's the kind of alchemy that Sharknado and a lot of the other low-budget shark movies are going for, but none quite make it work the way this does, I think because those ones are too keen to show us how in on the joke they are. This film almost has a 50s monster movie vibe in a 2002 package, which is a lot of fun.
I noticed in my original review of this I said it had "horrible acting" as a broad-brush commentary, but I meant that more in terms of the smaller supporting roles. Barrowman shouldn't have been included, because he wasn't horrible here, he was fantastic. I never watched Dr. Who, but I have seen him on Arrow, which I'm three seasons in on. He plays a baddie, and he does it really well, but it's hard not to love him and root for him. I think all of that stems from that famous line in this film. When he talks to Arrow and the scene is wrapping, I find myself saying "what do you say I take you home and eat your pussy?" While I imagine the people making Arrow would prefer I took it more seriously, and maybe Barrowman would prefer I take his acting more seriously and hate his baddie, but I also feel like Barrowman would appreciate my having fun with Arrow like that.
And with that, it's time to wrap this one up. Shark Attack 3 is available to stream on a lot of services. If you haven't seen this before, it's a must watch, if only for that line. According to IMDb, the famous like was changed to "...watch I Love Lucy." Hopefully the service you watch it on doesn't do that, and you get the line as it's intended, in all it's beauty. And if you want to check out our original review, you can search on the site's search bar, or click the shark tag.
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