Caroline Harris | Through the Shattered Lens

So, put yourself in Lydia’s situation.

Lydia (played by Caroline Harris) is a student at the local college and she’s doing her best to write the paper that will basically determine the rest of her life. However, she keeps getting distracted. For one thing, she just broke up with her boyfriend and now both she and her cat are practically homeless. While it’s true that she does have a job at the library, it’s doubtful that the head librarian would be willing to allow her to sleep down in periodicals. It’s just not done.

However, one rainy day, Lydia happens to stumble into an apartment building. The first thing that she sees is apartment manager Drew (Ignacyo Matynia), shirtless and doing manly building work. Things are looking up already! Drew also explains that he just happens to have an empty apartment. It seems that the last tenant left suddenly and all of her furniture is still in the apartment! Lydia can not only move in but she also won’t have to buy a new couch!

Sounds great, right?

Well, it gets even better. First off, this apartment is HUGE! Seriously, I was really proud of the first apartment that I ever got when I was in college. I mean, I had chairs in the living room and everything! But my little apartment was nothing compared to the apartment in this movie! Secondly, Drew is like really hot and nice and he and Lydia have instant chemistry.

Of course, there are some problems. First off, Lydia is terrified of the dark, to the extent that she has panic attacks if the lights dim, which is something that happens with disturbing regularity inside of the otherwise perfect apartment. Secondly, Drew is possessive and crazy and murderous. I mean, you probably already guessed that second part. After all, the film is called My Nightmare Landlord and it’s a Lifetime film. One of the rules of Lifetime is that any guy who appears to be too good to be true is ultimately going to end up committing two murders before tying you to a chair and talking about how the two of you belong together. That’s just the way way things work and that’s pretty much what happens here.

But you know what? That apartment is seriously nice. In fact, I would say that it’s such a great apartment that it might be worth the risk of having a nightmare landlord. (Technically, of course, Drew is just the apartment manager. But My Nightmare Apartment Manager does have quite the same ring to it.) Of course, Drew does take things a bit too far when he starts letting himself into the apartment at all hours of the night. That’s definitely not a good thing. I would probably change the locks after I moved in. Still, it’s a really nice place….

Anyway, this isn’t the first Lifetime film about a crazed apartment manger and it probably won’t be the last. As I’ve said in many other reviews, the familiarity of these films is a huge part of their appeal. I will say that Caroline Harris is a likable protagonist and she does a good job capturing Lydia’s fear of the dark and making it feel real. And Ignacyo Matynia is both dangerously handsome and believably charming as the apartment manager from Hell. I enjoyed the film almost as much as I loved the apartment.

Right now, the SyFy channel is counting down the days to the premiere of The Last Sharknado by not only rebroadcasting some classic shark films from the past but by also premiering a new movie each night. Monday’s premiere was Megalodon and what can I say other than it was one of the most brilliant SyFy films of all time?

Produced by the Asylum (the same company behind the Sharknado franchise), Megalodon takes place out in the middle of the ocean. An American military vessel is searching for the remains of a mysterious submarine. In command of the mission is the tough and no-nonsense Captain Streeper (Dominic Pace). Second-in-command to Streeper is Commander Lynch (Caroline Harris), who is literally fearless. Observing is Streeper’s mentor, Admiral King and the fact that the Admiral is played by Michael Madsen is just one of the things that makes Megalodon one of the best Asylum films ever!

Anyway, the Americans eventually find the submarine, just to discover that it’s full of Russians! Ivanov (Dimitry Rozental) and Popov (Aimee Stolte) may claim that they were just doing scientific research on sharks and whales but both Streeper and Lynch know better. And when the Russians claim that there submarine was attacked by a giant shark, everyone laughs at them.

Until, of course, the giant shark shows up….

Now, you probably think that you know what’s going to happen. If you think the shark is going to end up attacking the American vessel, you’re right. If you think that a bunch of random fisherman are going to show up and get promptly swallowed by the shark, you’re right again. And if you think those dastardly Russians have something up their nefarious sleeves, well again, you’re right…

But then there’s all the things that you don’t expect. For instance, a good deal of the movie actually takes place inside of the shark as the crew of a diving bell try to figure out how to get back outside of it. And then there’s the scenes of Streeper and the Russians debating global politics. And, as I previously stated, there’s Michael Madsen as Admiral King. Madsen only has a few minutes of screen time but he makes the most of them. He delivers his lines with a self-mocking gravity, letting us know that he’s as in on the joke as we are. He even gets a scene where he gets to talk to the shark while smoking a cigar and you better believe that he totally knocks it out of the park. A lot of people on twitter pointed out that no admiral would have hair as long and unruly as Michael Madsen’s but they’re missing the point. Michael Madsen’s job isn’t to convince us that he’s a career Naval officer. In this film, Michael Madsen’s job is to be Michael Madsen and nobody does it better.

In the best tradition of the Asylum, Megalodon is a wonderfully self-aware movie. It’s cheerfully and unapologetically over-the-top. The entire cast seems to be having a blast and they’re all a lot of fun to watch. Dominic Pace gets to deliver the Independence Day “We’ll Never Stop Fighting” speech towards the end of the film and he delivers it with just the right combination of sincerity and humor. Caroline Harris brings a lot of authority to the role of the determined Lynch and both Dimitry Rozental and Aimee Stolte are wonderfully arrogant and villainous as the Russians. And then there’s the shark, which is big and intimidating and who attacks boats and eats sailors with a panache all of its own. Megalodon is pure entertainment and it all works wonderfully well. Watch it with a group of your snarkiest friends and have a blast!

Megalodon gives us evil Russians, a giant shark, and Michael Madsen. How can you not enjoy that?