Open Water (2003)

Open Water

Matinee with Snacks

I wish I could be the first to assess this genuinely scary movie as

The Blair Witch Project in the Caribbean, but I have been beaten to

the punch. Everything that worked for Blair Witch (video, small

cast, complete isolation in the middle of nowhere) is at play here,

with the added implacability of sharks, creatures hat exist, for sure

and don't need lasers mounted on their heads to be scary. I don't

know what the Blair Witch is, but I know what sharks are. And they

are so, so silent.

Blanchard Ryan and Daniel Travis are the unfortunate couple who

bobbed for most of the film in the water. They are a normal couple,

with normal fights and normal stresses, in terribly extraordinary

circumstances. You've seen the preview, you know they're bobbing

alone and unmissed in the deep blue sea. What you can't know until

you see it is the agonizing buildup of tension, the apprehension that

accompanies any change in their situation.

I was clutching my companion (clutching back just as fearfully) and

moaning, just waiting for the shoe to drop, a shoe made huge and

toothy in my imagination; praying for something to cute the

tremendous bobbing terror half seen beneath the waves' surface. It

was riveting. Ryan and Travis have a heavy acting burden here - the

scene itself, the discomfort of the set, the reality of the lack of

shark cages, the intimacy of their story, the enormity of their

danger, and just carrying the film through all its waves of emotion.

And they have to be able to scuba dive!

Also like Blair Witch, Open Water succeeds by staying small. The

film Open Water was written, directed, shot, edited, and/or produced

by one or both of the husband and wife team of Chris Kentis and Laura

Lau. We hope of course that this is not some nightmarish allegory

for their real-life relationship, but the intimacy of the story and

the crew comes through, giving the film the very real feel of being

stranded out with them. The low tech video gives the scenes a sense

of immediacy and reality that would have been lost on gorgeous 35 mm

film. Even big time composer Graeme Revell didn't score the film to

be bigger than it was (he did a similar feat with Human Nature). If

Tom Cruise and Julia Roberts had been in those wetsuits, all we would

think about is what flavor latte they had in the houseboat between

shots. Here, you believe it was shot just as you see it.

The film is short, ending abruptly and chillingly, but it will stick

with you. Despite its TV Movie-style exposition, the characters feel

real, the setting feels warm, wet, and the fatal mistakes feel huge.

I was scared out of my wits,but it was highly enjoyable, and very

well executed. Trust your judgement as to whether you can handle it.

-- 

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These reviews (c) 2004 Karina Montgomery. Please feel free to

forward but credit the reviewer in the text. Thanks. You can

check out previous reviews at:

http://www.cinerina.com and http://ofcs.rottentomatoes.com - the

Online Film Critics Society

http://www.hsbr.net/reviews/karina/listing.hsbr - Hollywood Stock

Exchange Brokerage Resource

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X-RT-RatingText: 4.5/5