Combining a disaster horror survival movie, in this case a plane crash, with a primal fear of sharks is not a terrible idea. You would think this would give the filmmaker and cast ample opportunity to create, using two different playgrounds, so to speak. Sadly, Deep Water is devoid of anything really new, instead spending its runtime mashing together old ideas in a dull way. The characters go through the motions to get from point A to B, and eventually, you pray for the sharks to eat everyone so it will end mercifully.
We meet our pilot, Rich (Ben Kingsley), who is nearing retirement, and first officer Ben (Aaron Eckhart), who takes long flights to avoid personal issues at home. The passengers aboard this doomed flight include Dan (Angus Sampson), a highlight reel of annoyance; Becky (Kate Fitzpatrick), a grandmother with great one-liners; and Matt (Richard Crouchley), who awkwardly tries to impress one of the flight attendants, Cora (Molly Bell Wright). Throw in a family with kids, and you have your typical mixed bag of characters you will spend time trying to guess whether they make it through the film alive.
Director Renny Harlin is no stranger to the shark genre, having directed the 1999 cult classic Deep Blue Sea. However, he seems to have forgotten what made that film fun. It was no Oscar contender, but it was a cheesy, enjoyable popcorn flick that didn’t take itself seriously. In Deep Water, the dialogue, intended to maintain a serious tone, ended up giving us more laughs than the actual humor.
Once the plane crashes, Rich becomes incapacitated, and it becomes Ben’s job to try to save the day and keep as many of the passengers alive. The CGI-animated crash has some entertaining moments and places passengers in various difficult survival situations, even before the first shark appears.
As the film divides the passengers into groups that drive the bulk of the narrative, it becomes a slog while we wait for something exciting to happen. The sharks make rare appearances out of the water and don’t become a major part of the story until the second half of the film. As with Jaws, the best part of the shark threat is not seeing where they are coming from until it’s too late, and that does lead to an occasional exciting attack or chase scene.
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Eckhart and Kingsley are the obvious big names here, but it’s the likes of Sampson’s Dan and Fitzpatrick’s Becky that make the human interaction at least tolerable. To be fair, there wasn’t much to work with in the script, so they did the best they could with what they had, but the constant too-serious overtone sucked much of the fun out of the film.
Yes, a plane crash and being hunted by sharks isn’t exactly a barrel of laughs, but as in shark films like Deep Blue Sea and even Sharknado, you can play with the ridiculousness of it all and make the film cheeky and fun at times. Harlin and company play for a more serious story here, and with the chunky pacing and poor dialogue, it falters time and again.
I’m sure there is an audience for Deep Water, seeking simple escapism and not wanting to worry about plot and story. However, the film is sometimes painful to watch and is simply a disposable piece of cinema that will soon be forgotten.
Now playing in theaters.
 newest shark survival movie, Deep Water.){kind=link}