Shallow

Today I rented the surf/shark thriller The Shallows (2016).

This is a movie that was on the verge of being especially good, like 127 Hours or The Impossible where the protagonist overcomes insurmountable dangers of nature. The format of the problem solving portion of the film is really good. The problem is the back story. It's not that there is a back story, it's that it's handed to us though onscreen texts and some head scratching dialogue.

This movie would have been a success as far as a artistic film is it made more of an attempt to be closer to a silent film, much like All is Lost where Robert Redford only has a few short lines the whole movie. It's not a poorly made movie, the water, waves, and shark are impressive to look at and this eye candy translated greatly to the marketing campaign that was expertly timed. A couple of weeks before the release, the first trailers for the movie came out on facebook and twitter that were more teaser trailers than full movie recaps.

It's a nice movie that could have been greater, Blake Lively does a great job in a very physically demanding part. It's a worthy rental and a nice thriller.

Letterboxd review.