I rarely get the chance to watch movies that I simply just want to watch anymore. A lot of the time I'm watching new releases for review purposes, and these tend to be new releases of older films. As such, a lot of new stuff slips by me until a few years have passed. Underwater is one of these films. I can remember the trailer for it when the film was coming out, and how I thought that it looked pretty good. But it wasn't until this weekend that I was finally able to watch it; and boy am I annoyed it took me so long.
The film, set in the near future of 2050, takes us deep beneath the ocean surface to the Kepler research and drilling station on the seafloor in the Mariana Trench, the deepest part of the Earth. When the station is hit by a huge earthquake the station is heavily damaged, and the vast majority of the 300 plus crew killed. Several survivors manage to come together, and come up with a plan to leave the quickly failing station and walk across the bottom to a smaller station.
The group don their pressure suits and begin to make their way out of the station, but discover strange squid-like creatures feasting on the remains of the crew along the way. As the station explodes above them and they're forced out onto the ocean floor, they see strange, almost humanoid creatures illuminated in the explosion. As they continue to make their way to their only means of escape back to the surface the creatures begin hunting the group, taking them out one by one. Unfortunately, these horrible entities are only the heralds of something much worse.
One of the things that I thought when I watched the first trailer for this film was 'those monsters look a bit Lovecraftian', and I can't believe how close I got with that first guess. Spoiler alert time for anyone who's not seen the film yet, the big bad at the end of the movie is freaking Cthulhu! I love the fact that this creepy, underwater horror film turned out to actually be a Cthulhu movie, and the fact that they didn't push that fact in the marketing feels wild. Perhaps the folks who'd want to watch a Cthulhu movie would see the trailer and think the same thing I did, and would go and see the movie, but I can't help but feel that the studio not making a big thing about the iconic monster being in this film might have hurt the movie in some ways; even if it did make for a great surprise whilst watching it.
This being a Lovecraft horror movie, there are some other monsters in this too, with some Deep Ones making appearances in the movie to hunt and kill our main cast. The creature design is pretty awesome, and the moment where one of them essentially swallows someone whole is gross and shocking. They're used pretty sparingly throughout the film, and as the survivors get closer to Cthulhu they make for a decent series of foes to fight their way through first.
The main cast, headed up by Kristen Stewart, are one of the best parts of the movie, and they make for a decent group of survivors. The film moves at a decently fast pace, and we don't have a huge amount of time to get to know them before they're plunged into scary situations; but the cast manage to do a decent job at getting you to like them pretty quickly. Stewart is a great lead, and this is one of the only things I've ever actually seen her in, but I thought she did a really good job at taking the lead and being our vehicle to experience the story. T.J. Miller and Jessica Henwick are to of the better members of the supporting cast, and the scenes they were in were the more enjoyable for their inclusion.
I ended up watching this film via streaming, and found myself so interested in it that I've since ordered the blu-ray because I need to listen to the commentary, and see the behind the scenes stuff. I've seen plenty of movies that I've found enjoyable, but this is one of the few where I ended up wanting to know more. I want to know how this sneaky Cthulhu movie was made, I want to see how the monsters were designed, and I want to know more of the little details that are hidden throughout (I did pick up the company name and the hidden Cthulhu drawing in one of the lockers, but I'm sure there's more). I also love that the film seems to have taken a lot of inspiration from Alien, which is another film that I love.
I don't think Underwater is a perfect movie, and I can see some places where it could have done better; but it is a movie I think has gotten under my skin a little. I wanted more of it, I want to watch it again already a day later, and I think this is going to end up being a movie where I keep coming back to it.
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