Director: Charlie Steeds
Year: 2024
Country: United Kingdom
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Creature Feature
Plot:
Discovering a new object in the sea, a researcher joins a team of scientists to explore the location at the bottom of the ocean, but when they encounter a savage creature in the depths of the ocean while trying to return to the surface are soon faced with an inescapable evil preventing it from happening.
Review:
Frankly, this was a fairly decent if somewhat troublesome genre effort. When this one works the best is the initial setup and arrival of the group journeying out to the structure discovered at the bottom of the ocean. The first half here setting about getting the group together for the expedition and their qualifications to go on the trip, the first stages of the actual expedition with the struggles they encounter while down there, and the revelations made about the society they've stumbled upon all work quite nicely to bring about a rather fun starting point for this kind of film. None of this is all that original or unique for anyone familiar with Lovecraftian storytelling with the discovery of the long-gone civilization buried at the bottom of the sea, a series of monstrous beings guarding it, and the exploits that arise once it all mixes together, there’s still plenty to like here by getting everything together quite nicely.
There’s also a lot to like here with the various encounters at play offering some wholly intriguing scenarios. The first encounter when they arrive at the underground city where the gigantic creature arises from behind a mountain to torment the crew during the mission which results in some massive safety-threatening scenarios to put everything in jeopardy is a fantastic sequence to get a sense of the scale of the creature and the mission itself. The aftermath of that encounter sets the film on a solid route as the escape mission is further thwarted with the crew trying to keep the compromised sub afloat during the trip back to the surface but the numerous sabotage efforts that are soon discovered to be the cause of the recovered part of the creature taking over their minds to inflict psychological damage on everyone aboard. This sends the film into a frantic series of encounters with the creatures possessing the crew physically and mentally to carry out their mission to stop them leading to some fun encounters, plenty of great goopy gore gags, and some shocking outcomes to have a lot to like.
This one does have some drawbacks about it. The main issue here is the surprisingly obvious low-budget factors on display that make the film far cheaper than it tries to be. The majority of the film attempts to be far more impressive and grandiose than it should be with the idea of what the group’s trip is set out to do and how everything falls apart, but when it sets about doing this is flimsy equipment for something supposedly set to descend to the ocean depths deeper than any point on the planet it all tends to undermine the credibility of this somewhat. Other factors, like unrealistic behavior while trying to stay alive in a situation where not freaking out about something to a degree that a trained individual in that condition would never react to or a series of questionable behavioral tactics that don’t have any logical foundations, make up for some troublesome issues here and bring it down somewhat.
Overview: ***.5/5
A really stylish if somewhat flawed Lovecraftian-style feature, there’s still more than enough to like here that it comes off quite well although the few issues present here do have a presence. Viewers who are find with the issues, appreciate this kind of indie effort, or are fans of the creative crew will have the most to like here while most others out there turned off by those factors should heed caution.
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