Eagle vs Shark

2007, 1080hd

Johnny's comments:

Eagle Vs. Shark is a 2006 oddball New Zealand comedy where Lily (Loren Taylor) is an outcast who works at a burger joint and has a huge crush on Jarrod (Jemaine Clement), who works at a gaming store but barely knows she exists. One day, Jarrod comes into the burger joint to give the cool girl an invitation to his birthday party but she's not interested although Lily sees it as her chance to get Jarrod. She goes to the party with her brother and impresses him with her gaming skills, so much so that they have sex and start going together. Jarrod only has one thing on his mind: to go back to his home town and fight his bully. Thanks to Lily, who convinces her brother to drive them back to Jarrod's home town, he can finally achieve this. But things go badly between Lily and Jarrod as he concentrates on getting revenge on his bully so he ends up dumping her, leaving her stranded with him and his oddball family with no way to get home. After grumbling about this, Lily decides to enjoy herself for the few days she has to kill and that's when Jarrod finally notices her. Jarrod then gets in touch with his bully for a fight but it doesn't go to plan.

First movie from Taika Waititi is probably best described as odd-on-purpose, with two dorky characters who are hard to get into because of their awkwardness. Jarrod is just awful, always making things about himself despite being an outcast which leads to his abrupt break-up with Lily. Lily is a similar character but does a lot of growing up and becomes more interesting when she's left to fend for herself. The movie has this twee feeling throughout which is dialled down in Waititi later movies (Hunt For The Wilderpeople, Jojo Rabbit) and this makes the movie feel a little dated as it's the type of indie twee that was popular in the early 2000s and isn't really done any more, for good reason as it's very annoying. The movie is not without some good laughs but its awkwardness becomes overwhelming. OK movie, but I think it would be a better movie if it was made today mainly because it would've removed the more dated artistic flourishes.

Loren Taylor film clip (sample below)