Directed By Renny Harlin
Starring – Aaron Eckhart, Ben Kingsley, Angus Sampson
The Plot – An eclectic group of international passengers en route from Los Angeles to Shanghai are forced to make an emergency landing in shark-infested waters. The terrified group is forced to work together and overcome their differences if they hope to escape their sinking plane and the frenzy of sharks drawn to the wreckage.
Rated R for violent content/bloody images and some adult language
POSITIVES
Considering Renny Harlin has regretfully spent the last three years of his cinematic life helming what is arguably the worst trilogy in horror history, in The Strangers, there’s an air of relief and even redemption to Deep Water that makes this a welcome return to form for the action-celebrated director, especially within the confines of combining two subgenres of disaster and shark movies that feel obviously coherent with one another. Harlin makes some vital actions in attaining an investing audience to this film’s entertainment factor, particularly in not only taking ample time across the movie’s opening act to flesh out a variety of characters and corresponding dynamics, in order to eat away at some of the repetition in the movie’s eventual structure, but also this endearing element of self-awareness that allows the individual gags and overall tonal consistencies of the movie to keep from taking itself too seriously, brandishing a sensational fun factor to all of the violence and situational devastation that unlocks with them some endearingly enticing set pieces that equally appraise urgency and vulnerability to everyone involved. You almost forget that Harlin was the same man who commanded Die Hard 2, as his inconsistent record since has left plenty to be desired in the projects that he takes on, however the movie’s major set piece of this airplane crumbling and crashing is among the very best sequences of atmospherically conveying the unpredictably brutal nature of turbulence that I’ve ever seen put to film, featuring just enough shaking camera captivity and tangibility within the set designs to flourish a frenetic frenzy to what’s transpiring. This would be good enough to attain a recommendation for the movie, however the crash of the plane is just the beginning for these unfortunate survivors, as the movie then transitions from air to sea, with these shark infested sequences that effortlessly maintain the tension and suspense of what Harlin has by and large consistently articulated. Despite an overreliance on C.G backdrops and obviously artificial fish designs, Harlin exudes bountiful knowledge of where to place the camera to elicit unforeseen danger that only the audience are privy towards, leaving much of the generated ominousness of the characters’ isolation paid off brilliantly with energetically enticing sequences sure to satisfy the shark enthusiast in all of us. In fact, much of the presentation exudes a cinematic quality that helps overcome the obvious limitations of a 40 million dollar budget utilized for a high stakes action thriller, particularly with some meaningful overhead establishing shots and interior lighting schemes that not only bred a high class elegance to the appeal of the airline, but also atmospheric ingredients that stirred a corrosive cocktail to the movie’s aforementioned ominousness. Beyond Harlin’s magical touch, the film is performed solidly by nearly everyone in the adorned ensemble, but particularly Aaron Eckhart and 12-year-old Molly Belle Wright, who steals the spotlight from her experienced peers. Wright meticulously toes the line of overzealous emotionality that condemn so many of these child performances, counteracting this virtual minefield with a natural sincerity to precocious material, that elevates the obvious intentions of her character’s design, and while she’s typically deduced to one-dimension emotionally for the duration of her screentime, Wright pulls it off with the kind of embraced vulnerability that drives an empathetic quality to her character, a feat that not even half of these supporting characters attain throughout their various opportunities. As for Eckhart, Deep Water represents another opportunity to take the reigns as the movie’s lead, and he responds intuitively with physicality and resilience that makes him the ideally dependable maintained leader under pressure, especially with the abundance of anxiousness and anticipation that Eckhart lends to the role, in order to utilize the charming bravado required to be an action hero. While Eckhart’s emotionality is regretfully deduced to a couple of spare scenes that forcefully tap into the conflict of his character’s backstory, there’s enough captivating screen presence to balance a heavily derivative outline, serving as the perfect vehicle for Eckhart’s talents to hopefully return him back to more of the same leading man force of nature that he was throughout the early 2000’s. Last but certainly not least, I want to show tremendous praise towards the practical effects of stomach-churning gore that effectively elicits some brutality to the depicted characters in ways that showcase the aggressiveness of these underwater predators in their most vitriolic state. While the gore itself is meticulously utilized without ever feeling indulgently exploitative for the advantages of an R-rating, when it does materialize, it bakes carnage candy for horror hounds like me, who appreciate some red or lacerated limbs within the movie’s imagery, inscribing unavoidable stakes to the physical conflicts that transpire spontaneously to Harlin’s aforementioned credible direction.
NEGATIVES
Though Deep Water was an entertainingly engaging kind of pleasant surprise that overcame such unimpressive marketing, it isn’t without glaring faults in the larger construct of the film’s finished product, particularly in the murky depths of the occasionally detracting screenplay, full of its own detractive elements to take away from these characters and their questionable actions. For starters, the overwhelming majority of the dialogue feels unnatural in ways that attempt to shoehorn as much backstory exposition about these characters into their interactive language, without the means to experience them first-hand, in order to conjure a deeper sense of significance to understanding so many of them. This show over tell notion of storytelling is ultimately and unfortunately what keeps the characters at a grave distance of the audience attaching themselves seamlessly to them, in turn undercutting the emotionality associated with their untimely losses that makes so many of these scenes fall flat, despite the movie reaching so heavily towards them, all the while unsubtly zeroing in on mentioned aspects that hold absolutely no relevance to these scenes that they’re being discussed in, yet ultimately paints a red flag of predictability on what to expect within the resolutions of so many of these compartmentalized character dynamics around this crumbled aircraft. Speaking of predictability, the script also isn’t able to effectively evade the litany of tropes that unintentionally tie so many of these disaster movies together, leaving the film’s ability to distance itself feeling less possible with each oncoming scene that revels in them once more. Besides the aforementioned plot points of so many one-dimensional arcs that almost immediately write themselves into a corner with limited possibilities, the cliches also involve these on-the-nose kind of personalities who obviously serve a singular purpose to the movie’s intention, such as one arduously aggressive antagonist (Portrayed by Angus Sampson), who is such an unbelievably and illogically distasteful prick that he distracts from the focus of a scene rather than elevates it with nuance and compromised humanity. As can be expected with every one of these movies, this character’s sole intention is to obviously bite the big one at the most opportunistically triumphant time of the movie’s triggering, and while it will undoubtedly elicit applause for certain audience members who can’t wait to see him meet his untimely demise, for me it felt like the movie reveled in his crotchety unkindness a bit longer than necessary, to where I couldn’t even partake in the joy of his piper payment, on account of how much obnoxious damage that he unloads to scenes that require firm focus. Finally, while the production of a little known studio does render a cinematic appeal to the movie’s favor, the editing is at times a surrealistically strange and intrusive thief in the night that robs scenes of their intended impact, particularly within transitions from one character to the next, in ways that feel like them hem the previous while stretching the latter. It’s tough enough to overlook that the movie incorporates a fade to black consistency for the film’s 101-minute duration, but it’s even worse when some scenes don’t run long enough, while others run for far too long, a point made all the more obvious with an ending that simultaneously feels like it lasts too long while abruptly resolving as many as three tacked-on conflicts out of thin air. For my money, if the film ended the first time that it attempted an escape for these characters, somewhere around the 90-minute mark, then it would’ve attained an ever firmer framing to the movie’s finality, but it unfortunately doesn’t end at the moment its triumph can be felt the loudest, and that lingering reveling is responsible for testing audience patience at a time when it can be felt the most impactfully.
OVERALL
Deep Water is an anything but originally unpredictable dip back into shark infested waters, but its abundance of deviating character arcs, intensely riveting action, and persistence in pacing for a majority of the runtime, provides the kind of so-ridiculous-it’s-good kind of B movie disaster that is popcorn entertainment at its most shameless. While the film is plagued by predictability, intrusive editing techniques, and ever-increasing cliches of the subgenre, it does serve as a welcome return to form for Renny Harlin, whose escape away from The Strangers trilogy allowed him to find the artistry within himself once more, in turn cementing a spectacle of a survival thriller that feasts on frenzy, while refusing to take itself too seriously.
My Grade: 6.4 or C