|
New movie reviews, DVD reviews, interviews, and all things film.
Home | Archive | About | Blog | Lists | Links | E-mail me | Sign up for my weekly newsletter! | Safe House *** The Vow **1/2 The Innkeepers ***1/2 The Woman in Black *** The Grey *** Man on a Ledge *** Underworld Awakening ** Fullmetal Alchemist: The Sacred Star of Milos *** Haywire *** Beauty and the Beast **** Contraband *** The Divide * Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy **** The Devil Inside ** The Iron Lady ** A Separation *** Pariah ***1/2 Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close *** The Darkest Hour ** More Essential Killing Lady and the Tramp La Jetée Sans Soleil Story of a Love Affair 3 A Very Harold & Kumar Christmas 2011: The Year's Best DVDs and Blu-Rays More Year's Best DVDs and Blu-Rays San Francisco Film Critics Circle Awards Interview: Steve McQueen and Michael Fassbender Interview: Simon Curtis Interview: Werner Herzog Interview: John Cho Interview: Roland Emmerich Interview: Stephen Bishop on Moneyball Interview: Nick Swardson Interview: Lynn Hershman Leeson Interview: Lone Scherfig Interview: Jesse Eisenberg & Aziz Ansari Interview: Wayne Wang Interview: Andre Ovredal on 'Trollhunter' Interview: Ewan McGregor & Mike Mills Interview: Kelly Reichardt (Examiner link) The 54th San Francisco International Film Festival - 2011 Coverage Interview: Emma Roberts Rainn Wilson & James Gunn (Examiner link) Interview: Tom McCarthy Interview: Abigail Breslin (Examiner link) 2010: The Year's Best Films 2010: The Year's Best DVDs & Blu-Rays Interview: Sofia Coppola Interview: George A. Romero The Decade's Ten Best Films: 2000-2009 My Top 100 Films [Updated] My Top 60 Directors [Updated] Christmas Movies Essential Halloween & Horror Movies Cult Movies Actress Interview Gallery More Features and Interviews Not Quite a Memoir: Of Films, Books, the World, by Judy Stone James Agee: The Library of America Collection, by James Agee Just Making Movies, by Ronald L. Davis More Books Reviews A-C Reviews D-F Reviews G-J Reviews K-M Reviews N-Q Reviews R-T Reviews U-Z The online film magazine Combustible Celluloid offers new movie reviews, DVD reviews, film reviews, actor interviews, actress interviews, director interviews, film books and all things cinema related for the thoughtful and passionate. Online for ten years! Over 3000 reviews!
© 1997-2012 Combustible Celluloid |
Below (2002)Rating: 3 Stars (out of 4) Hell and Deep WaterBy Jeffrey M. Anderson
In the last five years, Proteus evolved into Below, and Aronofsky appears as one of three screenwriters and one of a boatload of producers. The new director is David Twohy (The Arrival, Pitch Black), a cult favorite among sci-fi and horror fans. Desite the complications, Below turns out to be a solid little thriller, joining a new breed scary of movies like The Sixth Sense, The Blair Witch Project, The Others, Session 9 and Wendigo. Its scares depend on well-crafted storytelling rather than copious amounts of blood or severed limbs. It's also the second submarine movie this year, after Kathyrn Bigelow's underappreciated K-19: The Widowmaker. Set in 1943, Below takes place on an American sub, the U.S.S. Tiger Shark, which has been on patrol for seven weeks when it comes upon three British survivors of a sunken hospital ship. Things aboard the sub haven't been going right; Lt. Brice (Bruce Greenwood) has assumed command after the sub's captain disappeared under mysterious circumstances. Crew members whisper different versions of the events, trying to sort out the truth, while levelheaded ensign Douglas O'Dell (Matt Davis), on his first mission, tries to keep the men calm. And even though the men consider the female member (Olivia Williams) of the British crew a jinx, she's hardly to blame for what happens next. The Tiger Shark keeps running into a German sub, its air begins running out (the hydrogen mix gets too strong), and someone keeps putting on a Benny Goodman record whenever Brice orders silent running. Half of what goes wrong can be blamed on technical malfunctions, but the other half is just downright spooky. (One scene involving a mirror gave me the willies.) Even with the film's low budget, Twohy and his writers do everything right. Minimal sets used to maximum advantage keep us off-balance, continually bringing up but never answering the question of whether supernatural forces are at work. A crew member who's an avid comic book reader even proposes his own supernatural ending: "What if we were killed during that explosion and those noises we're hearing are rescue workers from the land of the living?" Because the film actually brings it up, we know we can rule out that ending... but not before we consider it for a moment. Thankfully, the correct answer doesn't come out until the very end. Only a silly little epilogue keeps us from leaving the theater still trembling in our swim fins. Starring: Olivia Williams, Nick Chinlund, Matt Davis, Bruce Greenwood, Holt McCallany, Scott Foley, Zach Galifianakis, Jason Flemyng, Dexter Fletcher |
| Home |
New Movies |
New DVDs & Blu-Ray |
Features |
News |
Search Reviews |
Classic Movies |
Film Books |
Gallery |
Links |
About |
Contact |