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Overall Rating
 Awesome: 12.44%
Worth A Look: 33.01%
Average: 11%
Pretty Bad: 21.53%
Total Crap: 22.01%
13 reviews, 131 user ratings
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| Open Water |
by MP Bartley
"Blair Witch meets Jaws? More like Book of Shadows meets Jaws: The Revenge."
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It was such a good concept as well...Two scuba divers accidentally left behind in the sea on holiday and get surrounded by sharks? Hell, I'm there it sounds like tension to make your skull crack! The truth however, is far more limp than tense.Chris Kentis' low-tech dv approach sees two young yuppies Susan (Blanchard Ryan) and Daniel (Daniel Travis) take a well-earned holiday to soak up some sun and re-charge their batteries. As part of their holiday, they decide to take up an offer of scuba diving and head out into the big, blue sea. However, after a headcount by the lazy ships crew goes wrong, Susan and Daniel are stranded miles from shore. So what do they do? Swim for that boat in the distance even though they'll be more lost if it moves? Stay put and hope someone comes back for them? Or try and work out which way shore even is? These pressing thoughts are compounded however by the fact that they're not the only inhabitants. There's sharks in them thar waters. Tons of 'em. And they're hungry. And they sense feeding time.
It's too easy to compare 'Open Water' to 'The Blair Witch Project'. Yes, both are shot on rough, hand-held footage. Both take the notion of sticking with the narrative of only a couple of people stranded in a hostile location. But that's where the similarities end. See, I'm a big fan of Blair Witch. For the reason that it ramped up the tension and cleverly layered up the incidents as the film progressed. 'Open Water' however, doesn't do that.
Instead, we get the a splash of water after 25 minutes and we see the thrash of a sharks tail. Then after 40 minutes we get a splash of water and the thrash of a sharks tail. Then after 60 minutes we get a splash...do you see where I'm going with this?
Because it's one thing for the film to tell us that they're surrounded by sharks, and another to not actually show us. And yes, we never saw the witch in Blair Witch, but as that film went on, they got lost deeper and deeper and things became ever more scary and freaky. Here, once they're in the water...that's it. You can't actually tell if they've moved or drifted and there's no incident apart from "There's one shark...another...another". It's rare for a horror film to be so devoid of thrills. Instead the film is filled in with endless chit-chat and bickering. And whereas the three person dynamic of Blair Witch was well-developed and thought out, here the twosome of Susan and Daniel just become tiresome. It's a great idea, but sadly underdeveloped. Kentis has got to actually scare us, as opposed to telling us we should be scared. And Ryan and Travis never really convince us that they're truly terrified, meaning the film lacks the punch of 'The Blair Witch Project' or 'Jaws'.
It's not a total loss however. The sea itself looks wonderful during the day, with the sun reflecting off every lapping wave. But if the best thing about your horror film is how pretty the sea looks, you know you're in trouble.
But that's doing the film a disservice. There are two moments that save this from one-star suckage. A sequence set at night during a thunderstorm hammers at the nerves like any great horror film should. And towards the end, when the camera starts to duck under the waves like our fatigued protagonists, we finally get a glimpse of just how infested the sea is and it's truly chilling. A shame that for these effective ten minutes you have to go through 70 minutes of boring dross.I'm really quite sad that I've got to beat down on 'Open Water', because I loved the concept and I still think it's got great promise. When I think of the final ten minutes that only confirms the promise that it's got. It's a great idea that I'll readily applaud, but Kentis just hasn't pulled it off.
link directly to this review at https://www.efilmcritic.com/review.php?movie=8548&reviewer=293
originally posted: 11/05/04 00:59:07
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OFFICIAL SELECTION: 2004 Sundance Film Festival. For more in the 2004 Sundance Film Festival series, click here.
OFFICIAL SELECTION: 2004 Seattle Film Festival. For more in the 2004 Seattle Film Festival series, click here.
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USA
06-Aug-2004 (R)
DVD: 28-Dec-2004
UK
N/A
Australia
14-Oct-2004
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