Piranha 3D

Then-up-and-coming screenwriters Josh Stolberg and Pete Goldfinger wrote a spec script entitled Killer Fish for producer J. Todd Harris, the rights owner hired for Piranha due to their limited credentials at the time. Harris was impressed with the script and the duo were officially hired.[3] In 2004, hot off the success of his film High Tension, French director Alexandre Aja was given an offer to direct the film, titled Piranha: Lake Havasu. Aja admired the script but wanted to tone down the script's comedic aspects in favor of more "suspense and tension".[4] By June 2005, Chuck Russell was scheduled to direct the film, and made heavy rewrites to the Stolberg/Goldfinger draft, as well as incorporating elements from the original John Sayles script that Joe Dante directed the first time around.[5] Chiller Films and Mark Canton were slated to produce the film, while Dimension Films acquired the distribution rights in January 2006.[6][7] Russell's vision for the film, which would have cost an estimated $23 million, was described as an "underwater thriller" as opposed to Stolberg and Goldfinger's draft, which took place during spring break.[8] By December 2006, filming was planned to begin in spring 2007.[9] By March 2007, Aja circled back to the project as Russell would depart as director. Along with directing, Aja signed on to produce the film and rewrite the script with his filmmaking partner Grégory Levasseur.[10][11]

In April 2009, Elisabeth Shue, Adam Scott, Ving Rhames and Richard Dreyfuss were cast in the film.[12][13][14] The following month, Jessica Szohr, Jerry O'Connell, and Christopher Lloyd joined the cast.[15][16][17] Dreyfuss, at first hesitant to make fun of his career, eventually agreed to do the film after getting a higher payment from the producers.[18]

Production on the film was scheduled to begin late 2008, but was delayed until March 2009.[19] In October 2008, Aja stated filming would begin in the spring. He further stated "It's such a difficult movie, not only because of the technicality of it and the CGI fish, but also because it all happens in a lake. We were supposed to start shooting now, but the longer to leave it the colder the water gets. The movie takes place during Spring Break and, of course, the studio wanted it ready for the summer, but if you've got 1,000 people who need to get murdered in the water, you have to wait for the right temperature for the water, for the weather, for everything."[20]

Shooting took place in May 2009 at Bridgewater Channel in Lake Havasu, located in Lake Havasu City, Arizona. The water was also dyed red for the shooting.[21] An estimated 80,000 gallons of fake blood was used during filming.[22]

Asked about her underwater sequence with Riley Steele, Kelly Brook said, "It was really difficult. Holding your breath while making out with someone as hot as Steele. I had to learn to hold my breath for a very long time." Brook also said that the pair had to have "a lot of practice" before filming the scene.[23]

Citing constraints with 3D camera rigs, Aja shot Piranha in 2D and converted to 3D in post production using a 3D conversion process developed by Michael Roderick and used by the company, Inner-D.[24] Unlike some other 3D converted films released in 2010, Piranha's conversion was not done as an afterthought, and it was one of the first post-conversion processes to be well received by critics.[25][26][27]

Eight years after the film's release, Aja spoke of post-production disputes that occurred while finishing the film. He claimed that Dimension found effects artist that were much cheaper than the ones they had currently employed, this included artists who never did conversion work before. By June 2010, not a single piranha was completed for the film, leading to Aja reaching out to the Directors Guild of America to remove his name from the credits out of frustration. Bob Weinstein caught wind of this and fired all the artists and instead hired every VFX vendor available to finish the film. On top of this, executive producer Harvey Weinstein supposedly hated the film, expecting it to be more in line with Jaws, instead of "Jaws Gone Wild" as Aja put it.[28]

Piranha 3D grossed $10,106,872 in its first 3 days, opening at No. 6 in the United States box office.[34] In the United Kingdom, Piranha 3D opened at No. 4 at the box office, earning £1,487,119. As of May 16, 2011, Piranha 3D has made $83,188,165 worldwide.[35]

Piranha 3D received generally positive reviews. It holds a "Certified Fresh" approval rating of 74% on the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes and an average score of 6.2/10, based on 127 reviews. The consensus reads "Playing exactly to expectations for a movie about killer fish run amok, Piranha 3-D dishes out gore, guffaws and gratuitous nudity with equal glee."[36] On Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the film has received a score of 53, based on 20 reviews, which indicates "mixed or average reviews".[37] A tongue-in-cheek scholarly review of the movie was written for the journal Copeia (Chakrabarty & Fink 2011), which reviewed the movie as if it were a documentary film.[38] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "C" on an A+ to F scale.[39]

Empire gave the film three out of five stars, saying "Remember the film you hoped Snakes on a Plane would be – this is it! By any sane cinematic standards, meretricious trash ... but thrown at you with such good-humoured glee that it's hard to resist. It's a bumper-sticker of a movie: honk if you love tits and gore! Honk honk honk."[40] Christy Lemire, film critic for the Associated Press, said "Run, don't walk: Piranha 3D is hilariously, cleverly gory. Mere words cannot describe how awesomely gnarly Piranha 3D is, how hugely entertaining, and how urgently you must get yourself to the theatre to see it. Like, now."[41] HollywoodLife.com called the film "a campy masterpiece of a movie", adding "If you have an ounce of fun in your body, you will love this movie about killer piranhas that overtake a town of hotties – in 3D!"[42] Peter Hall of Cinematical.com said "The gore, the nudity, the language, the gags, the characters – it's all always on the rise. Just when you think things could not possibly get more ridiculous, that the film has peaked, Aja and screenwriters Pete Goldfinger and Josh Stolberg manage to ram another syringe of adrenaline into its heart."[43] The Hollywood Reporter referred to the film as "a pitch-perfect, guilty-pleasure serving of late-summer schlock that handily nails the tongue-in-cheek spirit of the Roger Corman original" while stating "Jaws it ain't – Aja exhibits little patience for such stuff as dramatic tension and tautly coiled suspense, and there are some undeniable choppy bits...but he never loses sight of the potential fun factor laid out in Pete Goldfinger and Josh Stolberg's script."[44] The Orlando Sentinel gave the film one and a half stars out of four, stating that "Piranha 3D goes for the jugular. And generally misses, but generally in an amusing way."[45]

The film was released on DVD, Blu-ray, and Blu-ray 3D formats on January 11, 2011. The "3D" part of the title was taken off the 2D releases to prevent confusion of the two formats. The film was released in Australia on December 30, 2010. The film was shown on British television on Channel 5 on February 10, 2013, for the first time, and in 2D format.

• "Show Me the Way to Go Home" by Mitch Miller & The Gang
• "I'm Not a Whore" by LMFAO
• "Fetish" by Far East Movement
• "Girls on the Dance Floor" by Far East Movement

• A&r [Director] – Eric Craig
• Cello [Electric Cello], Guitar, Percussion, Programmed By – Michael Wandmacher
• Composed By – Susie Benchasil Seiter
• Conductor – Michael Wandmacher
• Edited By [Music] – Joshua Winget
• Executive Producer [Executive Producer For Lakeshore Records] – Brian McNelis, Skip Williamson
• Mixed By – Mark Curry (3)
• Orchestrated By – Chad Seiter, Michael Wandmacher, Susie Benchasil Seiter
• Producer – Michael Wandmacher