Some films are half-baked from the start and never get
around to fully developing what could be a worthy premise. Jaume Collet-Serra’s The Shallows certainly falls in that category as it leaves the audience, as
well as its main character, stranded with no where to go.
Nancy (Blake Lively) is the damsel-in-distress as she sets
out to surf on a Mexican beach that was a favorite of her deceased mother who
recently fell victim to cancer. Having left medical school and at odds with her
father, the young woman is adrift.Â
Obviously, she needs to get her head straight and Nancy never feels
better than when she’s out surfing but this activity goes awry when she runs
afoul of a great white shark, who suddenly takes more interest in her than the
large dead whale that’s floating a few hundred yards away from both of them.
After the initial attack, Nancy finds refuge on a small
rocky outcrop that’s been exposed thanks to low tide and will ultimately
disappear once it comes back in. This
gives our heroine time to reflect on her life, see two would-be rescuers turned
into chum and make friends with a wayward seagull with a dislocated wing. These moments drag to the point of tedium as
little of substance is done regarding giving Nancy any sort of depth. Memories of her mother are glimpsed in
flashback and little more is done with the notion that there might be
unresolved issues between them or with her father as well. As a result, Nancy comes off as rather
vacuous, and while you may not hope she turns into shark food, you hardly care
whether she makes it or not.
The script by Anthony Jaswinski is one of missed
opportunities as well as desperate narrative measures. Nothing is done to suggest that the shark is
perhaps a metaphor for the doubts or unresolved issues that plague Nancy, which
would have made the film and her plight much more interesting. While this is a
sign of laziness the resolution to this particular shark problem is ridiculous,
making the old electrocution gag from Jaws 2 seem inspired. If you’ve ever thought there’s no way to make
a boring film featuring a killer shark, The Shallows is here to prove you
wrong.
This article appears in Jun 30 – Jul 6, 2016.
