User Reviews

When I was a kid in the 1970's, I was sitting in a B. Dalton's reading - parents routinely dropped kids off places to read without any fear of kidnapping back then - and discovered a copy of Alex Comfort's The Joy of Sex on a shelf. I had no idea what it was at the time, but the drawings (by Chris Foss, who would go on to work on Alien, Flash Gordon and Jodorowsky's Dune) were upsetting to me. Hairy soft focused seventies post-hippies getting it on didn't jibe well with my single digit mind.

I forgot what that feeling was like. And then I watched Tintorera...Tiger Shark.

This movie is based on the novel of the same name by oceanographer Ramón Bravo, an undersea explorer who studied the 19-foot-long species of shark known as "tintorera" and also discovered the sleeping sharks of Isla Mujeres. You may know him better for his role as the underwater zombie in Lucio Fulci's Zombi 2.

Here's the thing - this is a shark movie, but it's also pretty much a softcore adult movie about the three-way relationship between the heroes. As such, this is the only shark movie I've watched all week with full frontal male nudity, which is something of an accomplishment.

Hugo Stiglitz from Nightmare City plays Steven, born in the US but a Mexican businessman here in Cancun for vacation. He falls for Patricia (Fiona Lewis, Dr. Phibes Rises Again) but breaks up with her when he can't decide whether or not he's in love with her. Ah, the 1970's.

Jealousy ensues when she starts hooking up with Miguel (Andrés García, a real-life former diving instructor who is also in Bermuda: Cave of the Sharks), the swimming instructor at the resort. After those two dance the devil's dance and Steven gets all misty-eyed, she goes skinny dipping and ends up being eaten by a tiger shark that seems to have breathing problems, judging by the soundtrack.

The two fight over what happened to Patricia, but neither ever learn that she was devoured by a shark. That night, the two hook up with Kelly and Cynthia Madison, two American college students looking for fun, and swim to Steven's yacht as the heavy breathing shark follows them. They swap beds all night long before heading back to the resort and the shark decides to leave them alone. Kelly is played by Jennifer Ashley, who was also in The Phantom of the Paradise, Chained Heat and Guyana: Cult of the Damned, while Cynthia is Laura Lyons, which is her real name and not a stage name inspired by the Sherlock Holmes story The Hound of the Baskervilles. She was Playmate of the Month for February 1976 and actually led a strike amongst the club bunnies that led to better wages and rights for them. Other than an appearance on TV's Love, American Style, this is the only other acting role in her career.

Steven and Miguel decide to partner up both in a shark hunting business and in being womanizers. They start shooting all manner of sharks, but Miguel warns Steven that if they ever meet a tiger shark that they must immediately get out of the water.

The guys meet Gabriella (Susan George, Die Screaming, Marianne) and take her shark hunting. She hates it, but falls for both men. They decide to form a triad relationship where they can't be with any other woman or fall in love with her. Remember those The Joy of Sex drawings I mentioned earlier? Get ready to watch the play out as the three make love, make omelets and sightsee the Mayan ruins.

Sadly, the next time they go shark hunting, the tiger shark reappears - surprise! - and bites Miguel in half. Gabriella is so upset that she leaves, never to return. Steven vows revenge on the shark and beats up every shark he can find, upsetting even the most hardened fishermen. Surely, they tell him, he has killed the tiger shark by now.

Nope. It's still out there, killing fishermen and lying in wait for Steven. At a beach party with Kelly, Cynthia and two new American girls (one of them is Priscilla Barnes from TV's Three's Company and The Devil's Rejects), everyone skinny dips. As Steven and Cynthia make out nude in the water, the tiger shark comes back and tears the woman literally out of his embrace. Everyone is injured by the shark's attack and Steven makes a promise to kill the shark himself.

You may be wondering: how will Steven go about killing this shark? If you guessed "he's going to blow it up" then congratulations. You've been watching just as many shark movies as I have. Are explosives the shark's natural predator?

Anyhow - Steven uses a devilfish to lure the shark close and then he hears its breathing, because that's how sharks work. He succeeds in turning that shark into a million pieces, but loses his arm in the process. He wakes up in a hospital bed, minus an arm but filled with happy memories of the sexy times he shared with Miguel and Gabriella.

Keep in mind when you seek out this film that there are two versions. One is 85 minutes long and is more of a shark film. Then there's the 126 minutes long cut that's chock full of swinging Mexican resort sex. Also, a warning for those of you sensitive to these matters: many of the scenes of fish being caught and killed underwater are unsimulated. That should be no surprise to anyone who has seen a René Cardona Jr. directed film, as he threw live birds through windows in Beaks: The Movie and a cat over a wall in Night of a Thousand Cats. He's also responsible for the borderline insane film The Bermuda Triangle, as well as the scum-ridden cash-in Guyana: Crime of the Century.

Tintorera...Tiger Shark is one of the stranger films I've watched, not only in my shark obsessed week of trying to watch every single pre-Sharknado film of this genre, but really in all the films I've watched. I have no idea who it is truly for, yet appreciate its willingness to indulge in spectacle and scum, whether that be people hooking up or being eaten in front of your very eyes.

It will be difficult, but I'll try to keep the plot description as brief as possible. The movie opens with shots of a tiger shark. Next we see our main character, Steve, who meets and has sex with Patricia. Patricia leaves Steve for Miguel. Steve gets into a fight with Miguel that only serves to push Patricia and Miguel closer. After a night of sex with Miguel, a tiger shark kills Patricia. More scenes of a tiger shark. Miguel and Steve become friends and meet two girls, Kelly and Cynthia. They have sex with the girls. One night the girls decide to have a party on Steve's boat. Steve becomes furious and kicks them off the boat. Oh, I think I saw a tiger shark! Next, Steve and Miguel meet Gabriella. Soon, Steve, Miguel, and Gabriella are living together, playing together, and having sex together. Gabriella buys three wedding rings and the group becomes unofficially married. A tiger shark kills Miguel and Gabriella leaves because their threesome has come to an end. Cue the scenes of the tiger shark. Steve now meets Girl from the Bar #1 and #2. They go to a party where Steve trades them for his old lovers, Kelly and Cynthia. Everyone decides to get naked and swim to Steve's boat. Cynthia and Girl from the Bar #2 don't make it. Can you say "tiger shark"? Finally, Steve battles the tiger shark for 3 or 4 minutes. The End. (Okay, so that wasn't very brief.)

Tintorera is a nice example of trash cinema at its finest. It's one of the sleaziest movies I've seen. It's hard to watch Tintorera and not feel dirty. I don't care how it's listed on IMDb, Tintorera is really soft-core porn with a few scenes of a tiger shark thrown in so it could be marketed as horror movie and a Jaws rip-off. Throughout most of the movie we're treated to scene after scene of people in little or no clothing, both male and female, drinking, smoking, and having sex. When they aren't busy doing this, Miguel and Steve enjoy lounging around in their Speedos drinking, smoking, and discussing having sex. In fact, and I'm not exaggerating, Miguel's naked butt has more screen time than the tiger shark. These people are so busy porking one another that it takes them forever to realize that their friends are being killed. And, as the scenes of the tiger shark are so infrequent, I almost forgot about it too.

When we do see the tiger shark ripping people apart, it's surprisingly well done. I would go so far as to say that it surpasses even Jaws in the gory depiction of a shark attack. The sight of a tiger shark swimming with Miguel's head in it's mouth is as horrific as anything in most any other shark movie I've seen. And it's not just the sharks doing the killing. The animal killing in Tintorera is more plentiful than in a lot of the other, better known, exploitation movies of the 70s. In their spare time, Miguel and Steve enjoy shooting sharks in the head and spearing barracudas. The movie shows literally dozens of sharks, turtles, and assorted fish being killed. It's really nasty stuff.

Finally, a word about the rating I've given Tintorera. I'll admit that it's really not a very good movie. But, I couldn't bring myself to rate it any lower because it kept me interested and amused throughout. It's a lot like a car wreck - it's difficult to look away.

Okay, I'm going to go take a bath.

Without a doubt the most BORING JAWS rip-off you're ever likely to see, I had the misfortune to catch the extended two-hour-plus cut of this film – and did I regret it! A silly sexploitation film masquerading as a monster flick, TINTORERA is utterly inoffensive throughout, aside from one key area which I'll come to later. Now, I'm a great fan of trash movies, and I also love Mexican flicks: horror films, masked wrestlers, you name it. Knowing that Rene Cardona Jr. delivered such cheese as TREASURE OF THE AMAZON and NIGHT OF A THOUSAND CATS, I was pretty excited about watching this flick. Heck, his DAD made the cult B-movie NIGHT OF THE BLOODY APES, so how could his son go wrong? Well he did, with this misfiring, yawn-inducing effort at a sex film.

The main problem with TINTORERA as a sex film is that it's boring. The sexy is silly rather than sleazy, and even when a couple of women avoid rape by openly giving themselves to the rapists you can't find offence. No, the focus of this film is on the nudity, and there's a ton of it, although some male viewers might find it a bit dubious when I say that MOST of the nudity in the film is from the two guys...do I REALLY want to see near-constant butt shots from these chaps? Of course, there's a fair share of topless and full nudity from the women too, but it really does get boring after a while. Amusingly, two British actresses, Susan George and Fiona Lewis, turn up for the sole purpose of getting naked. Lewis appears for the first twenty minutes and wanders around topless before getting eaten by a shark (nobody notices – not even the viewer) while the awful George shows up for forty minutes in the middle of the flick and appears (very briefly) naked. We're stuck with her absolutely diabolical acting for a good long time, though.

What about the sharks? Well, truth be told, this film DOES have some of the bloodiest death-by-shark scenes in any movie. When somebody bites it (or rather gets bitten) here, the sea around them turns blood red for about a mile and body parts are everywhere. The problem is that there are only two such scenes in a two-hour-plus flick. So what does the rest of the film entail? Two guys sitting around chatting, sailing, drinking, and screwing. That sums it up nicely. Sometimes they speak in English, sometimes in Spanish, but it doesn't matter because they never say anything of merit. Now, I liked Hugo Stiglitz when I saw him in NIGHTMARE CITY, but this must be his worst role. He's just creepy and dull, if those two traits are possible in one character. Andres Garcia is mildly amusing I guess, but he doesn't have anything to work with other than his face-value attractive womaniser role.

I tried to like this film, and I looked out for 'fun' stuff. There is a little. The underwater photography is top-notch, and there are some hilarious Darth Vader-style breathing effects dubbed over the shark. But it's all so routine – so routine that I can't remember how the shark actually dies at the end, although I only finished watching this film two days ago. So all that's left to write about is the offensive bit, and that's the real-life animal killing. If you thought those Italian cannibal flicks had too much of it, wait until you see what's in store here: guys harpooning fish over and over again, for minutes on end. At least a few dozen real creatures died so this movie could get shot. Watching a fish – sometimes sharks – writhing in their death throes and bleeding all over the place is NOT my idea of a good time. It's cheap and it's utterly reprehensible. The worst bit is probably when they shoot a fish and we get a close up of the poor creature bleeding through its gills. Not nice! This sort of stuff normally doesn't bother me but it's so graphic and in-your-face here that it's impossible to ignore. This is why TINTORERA ranks as one of the worst films I've seen, an utter waste of time with no redeeming values whatsoever. I guess this is one of those movies where the shorter US cut is actually BETTER; at least there's less of this mess to sit through.

TINTORERA is not a horror film but more of a drama about divers who are shark hunters. This is not a "nature vs man" movie, like THE BIRDS or JAWS but more of a sexy light, sun-soaked drama that could only have been made in the 1970s. Even if TINTORERA is not a really good film per se, I enjoyed almost everything about it, except for the shark part. Remove all the shark scenes and you have a sexy little film from Mexico. Nothing deep or revolutionary but oddly enough somewhat original: it's basically a story of a threesome (two guys and one girl) who decide to hang out and have fun with one another, sans attachment. They do eventually fall in love with each other (as demonstrated with the ring scene) and the whole concept of a threesome, probably alien to 99% of people out there, is handled in a surprisingly cool, non-sleazy way.

Some call this film soft-core yet it's not. For example, we never see people having simulated sex. They're naked, wearing next to nothing or kissing but never having sex. So, as forward thinking as TINTORERA is, with the threesome aspect, the treatment is oddly quaint, certainly compared to what's on cable TV these days. It's much more entertaining than SUMMER LOVERS, which is almost the same thing but without the sharks.

The acting is mediocre. The actors are better when they act in their native tongue than in English. Andreas Garcia is handsome (he sorta looks like John Kennedy Jr) and he fares better than anyone when it comes to acting but it's probably not because he's a good actor but just because he's brazen and spontaneous enough to look like he's acting. His acting style is almost identical to that of a young Richard Gere (see BREATHLESS). Susan George is also not a very good actress but her role here is not easy (a girl having an open relationship with two men) and she happens to pull it off because of the cute naivety she lends to a role that could have been tawdry. This understanding of the characters for the threesome makes me think that the director had more than just sleazy reasons for doing this movie.

Am I saying TINTORERA is not sleazy? No. It is sleazy in a "grindhouse" kinda way. But like I said, the threesome is the film's least sleazy aspect. Certainly compared to the moment when the two hitchhiking girls are being raped and they agree to it. Totally ridiculous. But fortunately, the film as a whole is not always on that extremely sleazy level. Another questionable aspect about the screenplay is the girl who gets killed by the shark after spending the night with Miguel. The way her character is treated is unintentionally funny. It's a playboy's dream come true: have sex with a girl and then let the sharks eat your date. No worries about unwanted pregnancies or clingy girlfriends. Arf. And the multiple scenes of real sharks getting killed won't endear animal lovers to this movie, even though I find this less hard to take than the killing of the defenseless turtle in CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST.

Once the story settles in the threesome plot-line, the film is fun and it finally finds its groove. I really enjoyed it. It might seem implausible to many, personally I thought it was actually well thought out. It's no JULES ET JIM but the the three characters complemented each other perfectly. It's difficult enough for two actors to have chemistry when playing a couple but here the three actors have chemistry together. Unfortunately that story-line doesn't last the entire length of the film and when one of the characters is killed and the love triangle falls apart and film concentrates only on the sharks, the film never recovers. It becomes boring, certainly because the main character is such a serious drip and because the sharks were never an important part of the story to begin with. Had the film kept the threesome story-line up to the end or at least had a better resolution to their relationship, then I would have given TINTORERA a higher rating.

Another thing going for TINTORERA is the Mexican scenery. It's really beautiful and makes me want to move there permanently.

I like the 1970s attitude toward sex and/or nudity. It's so carefree and natural looking, compared to the plastic actors of today. Forget the sharks and watch TINTORERA for the 70s sexiness and the beautiful Mexican vistas. It's a definitive guilty-pleasure.

Not with me. What a bad movie! This has virtually nothing to do with sharks but more with the director's voyeuristic desires to be involved with a woman and a man at the same time in a sexual relationship. More on that in a moment. The first killing by the shark happens at the film's 20-23 minute mark. No one even knows the woman dies by the shark. The next death comes at the hour mark. There are two more deaths maybe three by the film's end. We maybe see the shark with all its unimpressive glory about five or 6 times. So what do we get in Tintorera - lots of sexual situations, lots of guys in bikini shorts sipping drinks or sitting on a couch or lounging in a hammock. We get lots of girls bare-chested. We get a bizarre(and sleazy) love triangle with Hugo Stiglitz, Andres Garcia, and Susan George. Garcia is the only one with ANY acting ability. George is pretty if nothing else(and that is all we have here with her). Stiglitz. I have seen this guy in other things and BAD is the first word that comes to my mind. He looks off into to space like he is suppose to have some life-changing angst to deal with. Instead it looks like he is having a bowel movement. He is creepy in every fiber of that word. The film ends abruptly and ridiculously. This is a clumsy attempt to make money on the Jaws craze. It is not poorly done in terms of directorial ability, etc...but in terms of what is done with the resources at hand. I didn't see the point at all. The script is the major problem here with all its inane dialog, and sleaze. Is this the worst movie I have ever seen? by no means. It is just quirky enough to hold your attention, but after awhile you will be scratching your head saying why?, why?. Fiona Lewis is the first girl that dies. She is gorgeous. In fact all the girls are gorgeous which is definitely a nod in favor of this sleazy yet primordially entertaining piece of whatever. It is not a horror film by any definition of mine. By the way, what is with the two female leads both being British? Hmmm.

Hooray for the internet.

Tintorera is a movie I had read about since my youth, and I knew it to be an exotic shark-based action adventure with some sauciness, featuring two of my favourite English actresses of the early 70s, Susan George (Straw Dogs) and Fiona Lewis (Villain), and furthermore the sauciness meant that there was a more than passing likelihood that they might be skimpily dressed. Or less.

As I said, hooray for the internet. Tintorera was found.

Oh dearie dearie me.

It turns out that my wish to see Mesdames George and Lewis in states of deshabille was sadly inadequate justification for sitting through, how can I put it, 90 minutes of tripe. The two English roses are more or less incidental, and one of them - sorry for the spoiler - becomes shark num-nums fairly early on in an almost exact retread of the opening sequence of Jaws. Except for the suspense, thrills and music.

Most of the film appears to concentrate on what, apart from their skirt chasing, would appear to be a fairly overt gay relationship between the two main (male) characters.

Irrespective of the sexual proclivities of the two fellows who spend much of the movie prancing around either in their bathers or bare-bummed, this film simply isn't very good.

How idiotic was this film? How is this film even a Jaws rip-off? Jaws had a story, hell, Barracuda had a story - this film has real footage of a meandering Tiger Shark and it's NOT scary.

The best part of this film was Susan George and Fiona Lewis, both looked stunning when they wear nothing.

As for the 'plot' - 2 guys hang out, pick up women, have 3-somes, and hunt sharks - why? Does it matter? And the way these guys act when they pick up women - WOW - you know you're in a movie as this stuff would never work in real life.

If you like beaches, boats, real shark footage, and Susan George pouting, watch it....but if you are expecting a good 'fish' film...steer clear...very clear...

Silly me! Here I was under the impression of owning a Tiger Shark horror movie, but instead there's just a copy of the X-rated Love Boat Chronicles in my DVD-collection! What the hell was this? I absolutely love low budget Jaws rip-off's – the trashier they are, the more I love them – but this has got to be one of the most incoherent and insufferably tedious exploitation movies ever made! "Tintorera" could be described as sex, tequila and sunny beaches. Oh, and a little bit of shark-action too, maybe. Now this may sound like crazy fun but NOT when you have to endure lousy acting performances and lamentable dialogs for 127 damn long minutes. Who the hell is interested in an extra long version of a crap film anyway, especially when the additional footage only serves more crap? This movie has no redeeming elements whatsoever, since even the sleazy scenes are uninspired and boring as hell. Hugo Stiglitz, who oddly resembles Daniel Stern from "Home Alone", plays a millionaire who parked his yacht in front of a tourist beach resort and stares at the girls in their colorful bikinis. He falls in love with a brunette, loses her again because their summer-love relationship is getting too serious and catches her cheating on him with playboy Miguel. The two guys become best friends and the girl gets devoured by a tiger shark without anybody realizing she's gone. Good riddance, I guess. Together, Steven and Miguel seduce a handful of other girls before the both fall for English beauty Gabriella. They then start the most implausible and retarded tree-way relationship ever filmed. Since Gabriella cannot or does not want to choose between her two lovers, "Tintorera" suddenly turns – for nearly 45 minutes! – into a romantic melodrama with few nudity (only male nudity, actually) and really pointless images of three uninteresting people talking. You honestly pray for the shark to pop up again and bring closure to this painfully soporific relationship. He/she does eventually, when the macho boys try to impress Gabrielle with their nasty shark-hunting games, and after killing Miguel this chapter ends suddenly, like it was just a tiny little sub plot. Steven returns to partying on the beach and taking random beauty-queens back to his boat for sex. When that annoying tiger shark kills yet another one of his girlfriends, Steven gets really upset goes after his nemesis. "Tintorera" stands for total boredom and irritation. The underwater footage of the titular animal scouting the bottom of the sea is nifty and professional, but I suspect most of these scenes were 'borrowed' from documentaries or something. It's rather infuriating how this movie contains truckloads of sequences in which fish and harmless smaller shark species are tortured and killed for no reason other than 'sport' and 'amusement'. I'm pretty sure it's real, as I don't see how you can fake impaling innocent little sea creatures. Perhaps it all was archive footage as well, but I don't think so judging by the diving suits the hunters wore, and even if it's all fake it still remains poor padding. I'm normally a great admirer of the gorgeous starlets Susan George, Fiona Lewis and Priscilla Barnes but honestly no one was capable of saving this disastrous production. My advise is to skip it, but if for some reason you do feel the urge of tracking it down, make sure it isn't the long version.