SANCTUM (a review)

SACTUM (2011) (a review)

This is the 3-D movie produced by James Cameron about people who go cave diving and become trapped.

The story: there's this guy who is a rich adventurer and he's diving in these deep caves to see the last bit of unexplored parts of the world. He brings his son along who resents him because the dad is more into adventuring than parenting. However, a massive storm floods the entrance and they become trapped in the cave and have to find a new way out and the son finds new respect for his father (sort of).

Was it good?

Not really. It wasn't horrible, and there is a lot of exciting stuff, but it doesn't really work for the whole movie. As with many of Cameron's films, the first 1/4 of this is much more character driven, showing the kid and the dad and their relationship, while introducing us to the caves and cave diving. All that is okay, but the relationship between father and son is too simple -- it never hits that spot where it becomes really interesting by itself. Thne the storm hits and they become trapped inside and for a while it's pretty exciting. However, after a while it starts to feel like a lot of the same stuff over and over. They move deeper, they get trapped and have to do something dangerous, they get out but someone dies, repeat. For all the tense stuff that keeps happening, it starts to feel flat and that's mainly because the character work just wasn't smart enough. Action should reveal character, but if the relationships are flat there isn't much to reveal. The only thing left to do is have people turn on each other, bu even that is never really done in an interesting way or done in a way that reveals something deeper thematically. Compare that to THE THING (Carpenter's) and THE DESCENT, which sets up much more interesting character dynamic and then finds interesting ways to explore it when they are trapped in the cave.

The other problem is with the action set up. There's a lot of stuff in the movie that I'm sure to people with the right technical understand is fascinating, but for a pleeb it's kind of confusing and hard to understand. They need to do a better job of educating the audience so we understand each predicament better. Most people think it is bad for an audience to get ahead of the story, but in places it is actually really good. It's foreshadowing. It's dramatic irony. It's tension. And those are all things this movie lacks.

And will all the people dying, I gotta say, this movie felt like a downer. I know the idea is that people have to die to show it is really dangerous, but when they are picked off one by one, again and again, it feels more like a horror movie that thinks it is an action movie than an actual action movie or thriller.

For action movie buffs there is probably enough here to enjoy a rental. For everyone else it's a pass.

*** AVOID (unless you're an action buff) ***