THE NORTH RIDING PROJECT

There were piranhas gnashing around the stern.  Some of the passengers were hauling them aboard on bits of string and they lay on the deck rasping and clacking.  They were only small but this wasn’t the point; they ate you in their thousands.  Even alligator skin is no protection; they will pile themselves on the creature and hollow it out in minutes.  “They are,” wrote the writer-diplomat Cecil Gosling, “the most dangerous inhabitant of Paraguayan waters.”  In 1926, his friend, a police inspector, had run into a shoal; he was so badly mutilated that he swam straight back to his revolver and blew his brains out.

Gimlette/Inflatable

Piranha sports a sense of humor to go along with the grisly critter attacks, as a boozy woodsman and a private investigator stumble across a crazed scientist who’s experimenting on a pool full of mutated piranha; along the way, the couple accidentally release the ferocious fish into a nearby river close to a children’s summer camp.  Piranha was followed by an in-name-only sequel, Piranha Part Two: The Spawning.  Other non-related flicks involving these toothsome creatures include MegaPiranha, Piranhaconda, and Piranha-Man Vs. Werewolf-Man: Howl of the Piranha.

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