Caroline Cole | Through the Shattered Lens

So, imagine that you’re living the life of Angela (Jade Tailor).

You’re married to a successful businessman. You’ve got a nice house. You’ve got attractive friends. Really, you’ve got everything that most people are conditioned to want out of life. And yet, you can’t shake your suspicion that something is not right.

Part of the problem is that your husband, Greg (Mark Jude Sullivan), has cheated in the past. And even though he says that’s all in the past, it’s hard for you to trust him. Your anniversary is approaching and Greg doesn’t appear to have made even the slightest of plans to celebrate it. Instead, he’s spending all of his time at work. Plus, you instinctively mistrust his assistant, Lisa (Caroline Cole). Maybe you’re being silly but then again, deep down, you know that no one can resist someone named Lisa.

(That’s just the burden that we Lisas have to deal with.)

You notice that Lisa is wearing expensive earrings. The next day, you find one of those earrings in your house. You immediately decide that Greg and Lisa must be having an affair.

What do you do? Do you file for divorce? Do you change the locks and kick your husband out of the house? Do you blow up his car?

Those are all good options but Angela decides that the best way to get back at Greg is to have an affair of her own. She ends up hooking up with Franco (Aidan Bristow), a handsome photographer. Angela does this despite the fact that Franco gives off obsessive stalker vibes from the minute that she meets him. Then again, it’s not like Angela’s looking for a relationship. Angela’s looking for revenge and you do strange things when you’re looking for revenge. Still, I would have gotten out of Franco’s place as soon as I saw all of the pictures he had taken of a woman who superficially resembled me. Franco claims that the pictures are of his sister, who died under mysterious circumstances years ago and …. yeah, it’s time to leave.

Still, Angela doesn’t leave. She spends the night with Franco. When she leaves the next morning and returns home to confront Greg, Grey can’t understand why she’s so upset.

“I know!” Angela says.

“About the trip to Italy?” Greg asks.

Yes, that’s right! Greg was actually being a good husband. He bought Angela earrings and a trip to Italy for their anniversary and he’s been working late to make sure that they would have enough money to afford it. He had Lisa set up the trip and he also had her deliver the earrings. Lisa thought it would be fun to wear the earrings before dropping them off which …. well, okay, that doesn’t make much sense but hey, whatever. What’s important is that Greg is not cheating and that they’re going to Italy and their marriage is not in trouble! Yay!

The only problem, of course, is that Angela’s already had a one night stand with Franco and Franco is not only obsessive but apparently a bit psychotic as well. That means that Franco’s not just going to take no for an answer….

You can probably guess where all of this is heading. This is a Lifetime film and any fan of Lifetime knows what happens when you get an obsessed stalker. Sinfidelity doesn’t exactly break any new ground as far as Lifetime thrillers are concerned but Jade Tailor gives a good performance as Angela and the film opens with an genuinely creepy sequence that’s set at a roller disco. Any film that features a roller disco is automatically going to be better than any film that doesn’t have a roller disco. That’s always been my philosophy.

In the end, Sinfidelity has a worthwhile message. Don’t cheat on your spouse unless you have all the facts first. Otherwise, your act of revenge might lead to you getting stalked by a psycho photographer. Seriously, the more you know, right?

Right now, we’re in the middle of SyFy’s Sharknado week. On Sunday night, SyFy will premiering what they say is going to be The Last Sharknado. In the days leading up to that moment, they’ve been reshowing all of their classic shark films and premiering a new shark film each night!

Thursday night’s premiere was Nightmare Shark!

Nightmare Shark kind of swam out of nowhere on Thursday and it ended up impressing the Hell out of not only me but almost everyone that I was watching it with. There’s a neat little twist to Nightmare Shark, one that will be appreciated and loved by anyone who watches SyFy shark films. In fact, it’s such a wonderful twist that I don’t want to ruin it for those of you who haven’t seen the film yet. At the same time, I really can’t review the movie without revealing the details of the twist.

So, consider this to be your SPOILER WARNING! If you haven’t seen Nightmare Shark, just take my word for it that it’s a scary and effective SyFy shark film and stop reading. Because what follows is going to spoil a huge part of the film for you. Here, I’ll give you a few minutes to navigate away from the page before I continue.

Here’s a picture of a cute kitty that the rest of us can look at while you leave:

Okay, let’s continue.

Shared cinematic universes are all the rage right now. In fact, SyFy already has one of its own. Ian Ziering making a cameo appearance in Lavalantula established that both that film and its sequel took place in the same chaotic universe as Sharknado. Well, Nightmare Shark established a second cinematic universe.

The film itself deals with a group of shark attack survivors who, having been plagued by shark-related nightmares, agree to take part in an experimental drug trial. What they don’t suspect is that the outwardly benevolent Dr. Novak (Tony Amendola) actually worships a Hawaiian shark god and his plan is to use them and their nightmares as a way to bring the shark out of their dreams and into the real world. Among the survivors are Jolene (Lulu Jovovich) and Rob (Thomas Ian Nicholas) and Gina (Rachele Brooke Smith) and Kaplan (Bobby Campo). Fans of SyFy shark movies will immediately recognize them as the protagonists of, respectively, Trailer Park Shark and Atomic Shark.

So, there you go. All three of these films take place in the same universe and personally, I would toss Ghost Shark in there as well. (The Hawaiian shark god definitely seemed to have a bit in common with the Ghost Shark.) Just as there’s a Sharknado Cinematic Universe, there’s also a Griff Furst Cinematic Shark Universe.

That was a wonderful Easter egg for all of us longtime fans of SyFy shark week. Since, with the Sharknado franchise wrapping up, this could be the final shark week, Nightmare Shark also gave us a final chance to spend some time with some of our favorite shark movie protagonists. Unfortunately, not all of them survive their nightmares.

Compared to the whimsical tone that’s present in most SyFy shark movies, Nightmare Shark was a seriously dark film. Make no mistake about it, this was definitely a horror film. In fact, it featured some of the most effective jump scenes that I’ve seen in a SyFy film. The nightmares were all nicely realized and properly surreal. The film did a good job of keeping viewers off-balance. You were never quite sure who was awake or asleep and you spent most of the film looking for little clues at to whether we were seeing the real world or the dream world. Though the film’s influences were clear — A Nightmare on Elm Street was a big one — Nightmare Shark still did a great job of establishing its own wonderfully twisted identity. Among the cast, the clear stand-out was Tony Amendola, who was enjoyably sinister as Dr. Novak.

Nightmare Shark was an effective horror film, one that proved that there’s still new twists and scares to found in shark week.