Stream This? is a feature devoted to exploring and reviewing some of the lesser known and often-times weirder films that can be found on various streaming services. Today, Roy Buckingham examines the 1995 movie Jaws 5: Cruel Jaws .

What’s that? You didn’t know they made a Jaws film after that abysmal Jaws The Revenge? Well, they did. The reason you’ve never seen it is because it never got a theatrical release in America and, until the DVD release, was mostly only seen in Italy and Japan. For good reason.

Jaws 5: Cruel Jaws is about a town that is having a regatta festival that is suddenly plagued by a killer tiger shark. A visiting fish expert and his girlfriend (who alternates between being bored out of her mind and horny beyond belief) have arrived in town to visit the fish expert’s father and younger sister, who had a massive accident which ended in the loss of the mother, the sister’s ability to walk, and the family home. All they have left is a shut-down aquatic park.

The younger sister is a lovely child with the angelic voice of a high-on-helium Warwick Davis. Their father looks like Hulk Hogan on crystal meth. Together they fight crime while teaching local kids the importance of saving the oceans.

OK, I am kidding, they just stand there and talk.

OK. The daughter sits, not stands, but you get what I mean. THEY DO NOTHING!

Anyway, they learn about the killer tiger shark when they discover this beautiful corpse on the beach that the regatta manager and city mayor want the sheriff and the fish expert to cover up and blame it on a boating accident. Sound familiar?  And here is that corpse.

Ain’t he pretty? Only the finest in rejected Louis Tussaud’s Wax Museum models to give us the heeby geebies. “Boating accident”, folks. 

Meanwhile, the man running the regatta is also trying to buy Meth Hogan’s aquatic park due to owed money on the property and has given Hogan 30 days to clear out. The family will have no other choice but to leave the Boondocks and possibly all of Astoria….wait, sorry, wrong film. Naturally the evil Regatta guy agrees that if the family can win the regatta, they can keep their land. Well, guess what happens at the regatta?

They have nachos.

Oh and a shark attacks. A “Tiger Shark ” who looks like A GODDAMN GIANT ASS GREAT WHITE SHARK! From that point on, the movie takes scenes from Jaws, Jaws II and Jaws The Revenge, and mashes them up into one giant pot of mush and there you have the rest of the film, as the “tiger shark” attacks.

I should take this moment to point out that this film has all the originality of Meet The Spartans when it comes to story and special effects shots. The film’s director Bruno Mattei infamously used footage from the killer shark films Jaws, Jaws II, Deep Blood and The Last Shark in order to create this “morceau de cinema” for our viewing pleasure. 

Do not get me wrong, as much fun as I had with this one, this film is terrible. Absolutely terrible. The acting is the pits, you can tell when the film switches to stolen footage, the “shark” is questionable, and the acting is all born of the Tommy Wiseau School of Acting. 

This begs the question: Is it really worth seeing? You bet your ass it is. Do not let the score I give this film make you avoid it: The film is so bad that it’s hilarious. Yes, I am giving it a KaBOMB, but that is on its technical merits only. When it comes to fun factor? This film is 5 out of 5 stars. A KabOOOOOM!

Thankfully, Severin Films has released this film onto DVD and Blu-Ray, and Amazon Prime has it available to rent or own as well, for people to “enjoy”. If you are a fan of train-wreck films such as The Room, Troll 2 or Birdemic: Shock and Terror, then you simply must add this to your viewing. especially to see what is going on in this scene below.

Jaws 5: Cruel Jaws is available for rental on Amazon Prime.