This very okay underwater horror movie is both better and worse than it would at first seem to be. 

Released in 2017 and starring Mandy Moore and Claire Holt, the film follows two sisters as they go cage diving with sharks during a trip to Mexico. However, when the winch breaks and the cage plummets to the oceans floor, the fun trip turns into a life and death scenario straight out of nightmares. 

The two sisters are basic archetypes, Kate, played by Holt, is the wild and impetuous younger sister. Lisa, played by Moore, is the older cautious and reserved one. Lisa’s boyfriend dumped her because she was too boring. This prompts Lisa to go along with Kate on this rickety old boat, and get into the shark cage that clearly looks like it’s barely in one piece.

Lisa’s entire character is motivated by someone and something that happened off screen months in the past. This is a screen writing 101 mistake. Claire’s entire character is based on events the movie deemed not important enough to show us. If she’s going to put her life in jeopardy, you need to show the audience why. 

The sisters spend a few fun minutes underwater in the cage looking at the sharks darting by. Then the winch breaks and sends them plummeting the titular 47 meters down. This begins the most interesting section of the film. 

They are trapped at the bottom of the ocean. Can they get out of the cage? If they can, will the sharks get them? How much air do they have left in their tanks? All these questions come one after the other. It’s problems mounting on top of problems. This is good screenwriting 101 stuff here. Put your characters in jeopardy and don’t let up on the tension. Mount problem on top of problem until they reach their breaking point. 

The trouble is, they run out of steam after awhile. The pacing slows. The threats dissipate. The movie is only 85 minutes, but it feels much longer. 

They get out of the cage and swim up to the point that they can regain radio contact. A minute ago it was too dangerous to leave the cage because the sharks were swarming. Now it’s okay. At least it’s okay until the movie needs it to no be okay later in the movie. 

This is the real problem. The movie is constantly contradicting itself. How fast are they running out of air? They seem to get to empty then spend ten minutes swimming around. They establish that sharks attack from underneath their prey. Then sharks start attacking head on. They can’t rise too quickly or they’ll get the bends. Then they swim up as fast as possible. These contradictions added up to be too much for me. 

My other big issue is that the film never picks a lane. It walks an uneven line between a fun B-movie in which the sharks are swarming and attacking them, and being a realistic depiction of what you do when you’re trapped underwater. Jaws is the former, Open Water is the latter. Both are scary. This movie wants to be a realistic Jaws or a more heightened Open Water. It can’t be both. 

I also just felt the ending was a cop out. Maybe I’d be more forgiving if the ending didn’t feel so cheap. 

Spoilers:

Lisa and Kate switch oxygen tanks with fresh ones that have been sent down to them. They are warned that this can result in hallucinations. We all see where this is going. 

Lisa is trapped in the cage. Kate is chomped by a shark. Lisa breaks free of the cage and finds Kate. She rescues her and swims her to the surface. She rescues her sister and gets her to the boat. Hooray!

Then a shark attacks. It chomps Lisa, but she fights it off and gets on the boat to safety. Then it is revealed that Lisa is at the bottom of the ocean still, hallucinating everything. Screw that. So Lisa’s character arc was that she was a boring coward at the start of the film and ends the movie a boring coward whose sister got eaten by a shark. She did not learn anything. She did not change. She did not realize that stepping out of your comfort zone can be a good thing. She did not discover that being cautious can lead to its own problems or that being reckless leads to success. She learned nothing and ended the movie having to be rescued. Screw that. 

End of spoilers

In the end it had a couple moments,  but was overall messy and disappointing. I do not recommend it. 

Not my Cup of Tea – D