Movie Review: 12 Days of Terror (2004)

The movie stars Colin Egglesfield, Mark Dexter, Jenna Harrison, John Rhys-Davies and Colin Stinton.

My daughters were in bed at a reasonable time Friday night so my wife and I ended up deciding to watch a movie together (she actually had a Friday night off from work). I went though a few choices on Netflix and picked this movie because I knew it was based on the real event that inspired one of my favorite horror films, "Jaws."

When we started watching this movie, I wasn't really sure what to expect from it, partly because it was a made-for-TV film. As it turns out, it was actually pretty decent.

I think the thing that I really liked about this movie was, while it was predictable, it was predictable in a good way. In other words, whenever there was a decision made, whether it was a lifeguard swimming into the water or officials deciding not to act, it was obvious something bad was going to be the result. As a result, I found I was on the edge of my seat more often than expected.

Another thing I liked about this movie were the various, unexpected, twists, such as all the effort that was made to stop the shark that ended up being in vain when it decided to swim up a river instead. While not as good as Jaws from the entertainment standpoint, it was still a surprisingly exciting movie.

Probably the only thing I didn't like about this movie was the growing love triangle between the two friends (Egglesfield and Dexter) and the one woman that they both had feelings for (Harrison). This is mostly because it movie never reached a point where it got past the early awkwardness and really developed it into a main part of the story. Because of this, I think it would have been better to just leave it out of the movie all together.

The movie is a surprisingly good docudrama/thriller that was both entertaining and educational. I would recommend taking the time to watch it if you have not seen it.

My Grade: A