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She Gods of Shark Reef (1958)

What will stick out most in this low budget affair is that it truly is low budget. You can tell not much is spent in this story of a prison escape of two men, aided by the brother of one, to meet with a hurricane, and get stranded on an island of beautiful women who fish for pearls in shark infested waters.

But Corman does a good job of keeping things fresh. This is a “cheese” film, make no mistake, and was meant to showcase a pair of hunks and a few gorgeous gals.

You can tell no money is wasted. But we don’t mind that we don’t see a ship torn apart by a hurricane. Only the most hopeless of dorks would complain about the lack of special effects, so long as the story is told.

There could have been more organization, however. The credits I saw on utube don’t even begin to match the names of the characters. If you look at the credits while watching the movie, you’ll go “Huh?”.

And the bad brother is a bit cliché in his consistent evil doings. May as well let him muse over taking over the world with James Bond as a nemesis.

Still, the ending is totally unpredictable, particularly for Corman, and particularly for modern audiences. One has to be fairly impressed that Corman can at least keep from giving us a cliché to end this one.