Review: Renny Harlin’s DEEP WATER – A Gloriously Entertaining Shark Thriller
There used to be a time when films just came out. Yes, they would have reviews that were good, bad or indifferent, but they would play simply as entertainment. Today there’s so much noise – maybe it’s devised by marketing teams as a way to get above the constant din of an increasingly hectic world, or maybe it’s just social media chatter that raises opinions and thoughts to such a level that battle lines are drawn and films are argued about and fawned over in equal measure before anyone has seen little more than a trailer. Then there’s the labelling of agenda, political or otherwise, that will blight a film as woke or… I don’t know…unwoke (?) before it even opens? Finally we have the rallying cry where a big hit is needed to ‘save cinema’. But somewhere among all this we forgot that sometimes movies can just entertain. And that’s what Master of 1990s Mayhem Renny Harlin (Cutthroat Island, The Long Kiss Goodnight) does with his latest extravaganza, Deep Water.
Deep Water harkens back to that glorious simple time. Where you threw down your cash, bought a popcorn and relaxed for some good old-fashioned entertainment. This is Harlin’s spiritual sister to his gloriously enjoyable 1999 killer shark flick, Deep Blue Sea. That film saw genetically modified sharks hunting down a pack of scientists in a sinking research facility. This time around Harlin ditches the science fiction, but keeps things equally far-fetched in this old-school summer flick that will reel in a certain segment of moviegoers who like their movies dumb, fun and expertly well-handled.
Aaron Eckhart and Ben Kingsley are piloting a commercial airline from Los Angeles to Shanghai when a fire breaks out on their plane (thanks to the thoughtlessness of Angus Sampson’s dumb-witted American schlub). The plane goes down, crashing in shark-infested waters and scattering the thirty or so disparate survivors in the ocean. They need to band together, overcome personal bias and attempt to stay alive in the hope that they will be rescued.
Deep Water is unabashed entertainment – a film that’s part disaster movie, part survival film. Aaron Eckhart’s gruff stoicism leads a cast of stock characters of soon-to-be shark food. The whole set-up is ripped right out of the Irwin Allen playbook, setting up each character that can be described by just a few traits and that you can place bets on if you think they be alive by the time the end credits roll. Always good value, Eckhart is great in this type role, offering up everyman heroics with the right amount of determination through gritted teeth. Kingsley seems to be having fun too adding to his already eclectic filmography with the added bonus of delivering some onscreen karaoke where he gets to see what life is like on Jupiter and Mars.
The visceral plane crash sequence is well handled, feeling exhilarating and terrifying in equal measure. Harlin is no stranger to aviation disaster having helmed the airport centric action sequel, Die Hard 2, but he really lets loose here delivering more than you bargained for and making you seriously rethink the long-haul holiday that you’ve booked for later this summer. Then, just when you think you’ve recovered, there’s a whole killer shark half of the film which adds another level to proceedings. The visual effects are little better than when Harlin had Thomas Jane and Samuel L. Jackson go swimming with sharks at the end of the last century, but things are just as preposterous and ridiculously entertaining. If you’re looking for some Discovery Channel style realism then you’re going to have to get that elsewhere.
Deep Water is a fun 1990s style popcorn flick that delivers high on the entertainment front. It’s totally preposterous and the characterisation is basically non-existent, but this silly throwback flick is a whole lot of fun. And I’m all onboard for that!
