Open water - En eaux profondes

If this was a high budget A-film it would have sharks 10 meters long, the guy would wrestle one of them with a knife and the woman would show off huge boobs all the time. Instead there are no theatrically exaggerated shark attack scenes, but totally believable, down to earth dialogs and things we would expect to happen in this situation. The ending also unexpected and non-hollywoodical. Worth watching.

First of all congratulations to Chris Kentis for spotting this topic and writing and directing the film. Now you can tell after praising the film maker up front the rest of this review is going to be quite critical! This film unnerved me, it made me feel uncomfortable as well and that's the problem - it should have frightened the absolute living daylights out of me! Because I rate being deserted at sea in shark-infested waters right up there in the scary-stakes with being buried alive. Now I respect Mr Kentis and his collaborators decision to tell the story in a very minimalist way, I guess they considered this story was powerful enough on its own not to require a heavy hand, and I could have agreed with them pre production. But now having seen it I don't think it was. I'm not saying they needed full on John Williams score and masses of special effects but perhaps varying the camera angles a bit more would have worked better.

Most of the story is told with the camera in an elevated position looking down on the protagonists, i.e a boat! This means I am divorced from any threat or the action. Couldn't we have got down to eye level more allowing us to feel we were more apart of the story? It was our toes about be chomped off? I'm afraid in the drama stakes this movie never got anymore dramatic than the average TV docu-drama and that's a real shame for after coming up with this concept and creating a half decent script Mr Kentis has missed an opportunity to create a classic.

An excellent example of how a very high-quality survival film can be made for a low budget. The emphasis in the film is on the development of relationships in a couple thrown into the sea. Sharks appear in moments, which is not surprising for such a budget, but closer and closer each time. This is enough to understand the hopelessness of the situation. Shots with a couple in the water and parties on the shore alternate very successfully. Everyone is having fun and is not even aware of the tragedy unfolding at the same time. The actors play great, especially given the shooting conditions. An excellent film about how people find themselves helpless and defenseless on the open sea.

I guess I'm simply dense because I failed to understand why previous critics raved about this boring,boring movie and how some of them were so scared and distraught that brain numbness overwhelmed them. This fragmented ,tiresome story was just plain silly --Imagine a crew member who can't count to twenty and the feeble overused gimmick of contrasting the couples' plight with all the bustle and liveliness of natives in an outdoor shopping mall. Cut to the luckless couple , heads just bobbing along for over an hour in a monotonous sea. Exciting,no! Throw in the mandatory shark attack and your fright knows no bounds. I have this uneasy feeling that because of all the overworked hype, people feel compelled to rave about it, lest they admit (like me) to having been taken in. Simply, just an insipid travesty. Don't waste your money!

This movie was never about character development. This movie is

never about a couple having a fight. This movie is not about

sharks. This movie was never meant to be filmed in a pro way.

This movie is about how your will and your life falls to pieces when

facing something that could be a nightmare and you feel you're

totally awake. This movie is about desperation, about your life

being taken from you with hours to feel how you will not be the

same, because you know it's over for you, but you don't want to

believe it... something we like to call hope.

You may have entered Open Water willing to eat all your popcorn

and coming out of the theater telling jokes and feeling life is here

forever. But this movie is about the opposite.

This is a wonderful film, and I thought Susan was going to be

bit**ing all the time and stuff, but she didn't. The ending was so

damn sad. I left the theater in a quiet fashion. I couldn't say a word

to my girlfriend because I knew she felt for them too.

You don't need character development when you turn on the news

and see millions of unknowns blown to pieces or starving. You

don't need it because you know they are like you. Made of the

same matter, and as fragile as any other animal.

Open Water is a beautiful piece of movie-making, and it's so

human that it's almost unreal.