Review of Deep Blue Sea (1999) by Deven P — 14 Jul 2014

If you take a ludicrous plot involving super smart sharks, an impossible setting aping Sealab 2021, and improbable casting pitting LL Cool J, a failed Punisher, and the future Nick Fury against a CGI Dino-fish, you know you've just stepped in Deep Blue something. Just because this muddled undersea non-thriller winks at the audience as if to say "Hey, we're going for a B-Movie feel" doesn't make this Z-Grade pill go down any easier. "Beneath it's glassy surface...a world of gliding monsters." And THEN Michael Rappaport shows up. Chewing more scenery than Sterling Hayden on a bender, he and the rest of the cast go for broke, using histrionics to drown out the inevitable Rifftrax quipping that was sure to follow. Sure, it puts forth a phony baloney backstory about using shark brains to find an Alzheimer's cure, but the only ones who will want to perpetually forget this moment are moviegoers.

In this R-rated thriller, a scientific crew (Jane, Burrows, Samuel L. Jackson, LL Cool J) on an isolated research facility become the bait as three intelligent sharks fight back.

"What you've done is knocked us down the goddamn food chain." Yep, this line gets delivered by Jane...with some deathly serious rage-tinged vigor, it must be said. Die Hard 2 and Cliffhanger director Renny Harlin is capable of crafting over-the-top thrills and, truthfully, Deep Blue Sea boasts a few. Here, however, everything - from the lines spoken to the bodies eaten - gets over-the-top treatment. Only 2 of the cast make it out of this Grindhouse thriller wannabe (think: locked Jaws) alive, but no one truly gets away without some psychological damage...audiences mostly.

Bottom line: Shark Weak.