IMAX film shows sharks from a different angle

Shark! Movie!

“Great White Shark,” now showing at the Riverfront Park IMAX Theatre, offers dramatic encounters and dreamy underwater photography of the predators and their environs.

But the real predators, it notes, are humans.

“From the depths of the ocean and the depths of prehistory comes the predator we love to fear,” intones a narrator in a trailer for the film. “But is it the monster we’ve imagined it to be?”

The 40-minute film aims to raise awareness of sharks’ plight: Millions are killed by fishermen annually, especially for shark-fin soup, and many species are endangered.

The film’s crew documented great whites in multiple habitats: Mexico’s Guadalupe Island; Stewart Island off New Zealand; the waters near Los Angeles; and the South African coast, where “flying” great whites shoot up from the ocean’s depths to catch seals at the surface, then shoot through the air.

“Our mission is to change people’s attitudes toward the great white,” co-director Steve McNicholas said in a news release. “It’s not the menacing, evil predator it’s made out to be. It’s simply performing its crucial role at the top of the ocean’s food chain.”

Adrian Rogers

When: Showing through Labor Day with multiple screenings daily. Go to www.spokaneriverfront park.com and click on “Giant Screen IMAX Movies” for showtimes.

Where: The Riverfront Park IMAX Theatre is in the U.S. Pavilion area of the downtown park.

Tickets: $8.50 for adults; $7.50 for teens 13 to 17, adults 62 and older and members of the military with ID; $6 for children 3 to 12. Children 2 and younger get in free with a paying adult.