Director: John Stockwell
Year: 2012
Country: US/United Kingdom/South Africa/Germany/France
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Sharks
Plot:
After an accident forces her out of the water, a traumatized shark expert finds a possible chance at redemption guiding a thrill-seeker through shark-infested waters only for her worst fears to come back and haunt her.
Review:
On the whole, this was quite a disappointing and barely worthwhile killer shark thriller. That is the biggest issue here with this one, the fact that far too much of this one is an overblown drama about her experience and condition that it stops the film cold to deal with an endless series of uninteresting scenes that do nothing but eat up time. The endless scenes of everyone worrying about her and the stubbornness to get help from them or others really just end up going nowhere as it's not until the clichéd storyline of overdue bills that brings about the end of the funk which is really quite a common theme that it's completely unsurprising to see it being the catalyst for everyone. The scenes of her leading the tour for the group are hardly any more enjoyable and there's a large slew of scenes that are just painful to get through as they banter and tease each other which really shouldn't occur in such a situation as many of the jokes there could potentially lead to injury or death in an accident so there's a lot of questionable motives in place there which just continues the excruciatingly long time this one takes to actually do anything.
On top of that, this one again goes for the drama with the out-of-nowhere revelation about the reason for being on the guided tour and really just overall taking this one so far out of the horror realm that it's well over an hour before there are any signs of shark attacks going on. The few glimpses seen here are nothing more than spliced shots from a number of National Geographic-style show specials relating to the creature and generally make for a more engaging and coherent watch than the clumsy way they're edited in here with the action occurring and them reacting to it from another camera edit, and altogether this makes for some wholly uninteresting and bland experiences.
There are a few somewhat decent elements here with this one really showing off a much more realistic and positive image of the creatures than would normally be the case for such a film here, really getting a good chance to look at their lifestyle and grace that they portray in real life which is a rather enjoyable experience rather than painting them up to be flesh-crazed monsters. It still delves into that territory quite readily with the early attack proving to be completely understandable in terms of setting up her fears and the final half-hour is full of great fun with them being forced to survive against the elements and the sharks continually around them, but it's still not quite enough to make it against the other flaws here.
Overview: *.5/5
Despite the fact that it's trying to do something positive in a world of cheesy killer shark efforts, the fact that this one tends to focus more on banal thriller and dramatic elements isn't as interesting to watch as it thinks it is leaving the film to be quite dull overall. Only give this one a look if you're a fan of the creative crew or interested in the subject matter presented but those looking for a straightforward genre effort should heed extreme caution with this one.
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