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The Shallows (2016) - Movie Review


The Shallows is a film about a women who goes to this very secluded beach for surfing, where a big shark attacks and strands her in the shallows, where she must find a way to survive. The only shark attack movies you get these days are the likes of Sharknado, so this being hyped as a proper shark attack film was something I was looking forward to.

From the start, you could tell that this would be a good looking movie. Yeah it felt like a Go-Pro commercial in those starting minutes, but it looked pretty good, so who cares. The beach itself was beautiful, and the director fully utilized the location. Loved the cinematography, well, minus the slow mo shots. There were perhaps a bit too many of them. 

Blake Lively looked very lively, and she did a pretty good job. There were moments where I thought she was a bit iffy, but overall she gave a good performance, especially considering the state her character is in for most of the movie. There was some backstory to her character but it wasn't that interesting, so I didn't care much whether her character lived or died, which is something you don't want to happen in a movie like this. The character I did care for was the seagull. You heard me right, it was such a nice touch to add that cute creature as a side character.

The Shark looked great, for the most part. CGI was good enough, but in scenes where they showed too much of the shark, especially in the finale, it started looking fake. 

The movie has some intense sequences, that put you on the edge and inject a good amount of thrill, especially the first shark attack, which I thought was awesome. BUT they are very few and far between. And in between, you get a 127 hours type movie, but just not that good, which slows the movie down considerably. You also have to suspend your disbelief a bit too much at time, which was kinda annoying. 

All in all, I was hoping for some more build up/suspense and thrill which kinda left me disappointed, BUT still a decent shark attack movie to have come out in a long long time. 

7/10
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