Titanic II (2010)

Best bad quote: "Airplanes are big, babe. Trains are big. This? This is monumental."

The Asylum sometimes puts out some pretty good films. I mean, pretty good as long as you think of them in the context of what they are: direct to DVD, cheap schlock made solely for raking in cash. When The Asylum does good, sometimes their films are actually decent movies, sometimes their films are just mindless fun, and, sometimes, their films are just hilariously bad. And, a lot of the time, unfortunately, their lowest common denominator films are just plain boring.

"Titanic II" is less electric boogaloo and more a bland Saturday afternoon film perfect for filling up time slots on SyFy. I find it hard to believe that you could take this ludicrous premise and make it bland, but it happened.  In the film, someone with too much money and too little grey matter commissions a replica of the Titanic, calls it Titanic II, and has it set sail on the exact date the original Titanic did. That someone would tempt fate that casually is inherently hilarious. However, the rest of the film's mediocrity really overwhelms that hysterical nugget of idiocy.

This surely will not end in tragedy.

The first three minutes of the film consists of some guy preparing for and then surfing a wave caused by a glacier falling into the ocean. You might wonder, as I did, if this has anything to do with the story. Surprisingly, it does. You see, the Titanic II's downfall this time is not just caused  by one man's hubris and a glacier. It's global warming and two huge chunks of glacier that fall into the ocean. The first causes icebergs to smash into the ship, piercing the hull. And, just to add insult to injury,  the second wave wipes out all the passengers who managed to escape via lifeboat and turns the ship over. The Titanic II's maiden voyage was even more of a clusterfuck than its predecessor's.

The "love-story" in this film involves the young-ish playboy who commissioned the ship and his ex-girlfriend, a nurse that he hired to work on the ship. Once the four women he showed up with die (or are rescued via helicopter), he and his ex make amends while frantically attempting to escape the sinking ship. As seen in the titanic piece of shit that was 2012, imminent death plus conveniently dead current love interest equals reconciliation for ex lovers. Let's hope that the next time my heart is broken by some douchebag, a disaster will soon be on the horizon to bring us back together.  

I appreciate that though The Asylum just makes films just for the money, films that essentially rip off Hollywood, occasionally their films skew enough from Hollywood to make them worth watching. They skew from Hollywood not only in the sense that the films are lower budget, B to Z grade films, but also in the sense that they do take some risks that we don't usually see in the typical Blockbusters. 

I say usually, because in this case, the male love interest dies saving the female's life, just like in Titanic. In most insipid movies like Titanic II, though, your possession of a love interest means you'll likely live if they live. I mean, who wants to survive a disaster if you've got no one to bone afterward? So, in this case, the love interests' death is a bit of a surprise. This isn't the "What if the movie Titanic had a happier ending?" that is expected.   

     

And really, that's all there is to say about the film. It's just bland. The CGI is bad, the character's are unlikable and the story is uninspired. I really wish the "Titanic II" could have been better, but The Asylum really failed this time. Despite a great title that is just begging to become a classic piece of B movie trashy fun, Titanic II turns out to be one of The Asylum's more forgettable films.

Rating: 2 Sets of Arm Candy out of 5