REVIEWS

"DEEP BLUE SEA"

For a reason I can't really understand, Renny Harlin is a director who's hated among the film geeks. Was it just because of the disastrous"Cutthroat Island"? I never saw it, so I wouldn't know. The movies that he directed that I saw were movies I enjoyed: "Cliffhanger," "Die Hard 2: Die Harder," "A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master," and the underrated Andrew "Dice" Clay movie, "The Adventures of Ford Fairlane." None of those movies are considered masterpieces, but I DID enjoy 'em all. Though I never saw "The Long Kiss Goodnight," the people I've asked either love it or hate it. "Deep Blue Sea" is Renny Harlin's latest and it's a movie that has sharks attacking people. It's obviously gonna be perceived as a "Jaws" rip-off, but it really isn't. And it's not as good either. Still, it's a lot better than the sequels.

The sharks look kinda real, but they look kinda fake, too. I guess they look real until they attack. It just seemed to me like they moved too fast. It didn't bother me, though. As a matter of fact, it made the attack more exciting. In "Anaconda," it was different. When Jon Voight climbs up the ladder and the big snake wraps around the ladder and bares his fangs, it looks terrible. It looks so fake, it's pathetic, and the biggest reason was because of how fast it moved. I don't really know why it seemed to work in "Deep Blue Sea," but it DID work, and that's what counts.

"Deep Blue Sea" was a well-acted movie, but that's no surprise considering who was in it. Samuel L. Jackson, as always, is the man. Sam's the man. The guy is simply one of the best. Than there's Thomas Jane, a guy who was good in "Boogie Nights" as the drug dealer friend of "Dirk Diggler," and was also good in the extremely controversial movie "Thursday" (many have called the movie racist, and it's easy to see why... still, you hafta see it because Paulina Porizkova is shockingly convincing in her evil role, and it has a really odd scene where she rapes Thomas Jane). He's a really good actor. A lot better than Christopher Lambert, who looks like his twin. Stellan Skarsgard was in the movie, too. You may remember him as Matt Damon's math guru in "Good Will Hunting" before Robin Williams took over. Michael Rapaport is in the movie as a genius, but he still sounds like what he ALWAYS sounds like... a street kid. But he really is a good actor. LL Cool J was in the movie, and he was very good... actually, he was probably the best ones in the movie. I was really surprised by his performance. Someone else who surprised me was Saffron Burrows. Since I'd never heard of her before, I thought she was just another hottie trying to act, but she was very good, even though the role required almost no emotion.

I don't care what my fellow film geeks say, I think that Renny Harlin is a good director. The script was written by Duncan Kennedy (this is his feature film debut as a writer, but interestingly enough, he was the Art Department Assistant on "Terminator 2: Judgment Day"), Wayne Powers & Donna Powers (this is the debut for them, too). There's nothing in this movie that's truly revolutionary, but that's not to say that there aren't any surprises.

"Deep Blue Sea" is just what you think it is: a mindless action movie that will entertain you for two hours. It doesn't pretend to be anything but that, so it does what it set out to do.

Scale of 1-10: 7