3/10
If you go down a big hole today, you're sure to get mighty wet, and probably dead. Especially if the hole is very large, very dangerous, and full of water. Unfortunately, the film itself is full of nothing but hot air, bad writing, worse acting and the pulsating thrills of a soggy duvet.
The only 2 reasons I can think of why anyone might go and see this film are a) that James Cameron's name is attached to it and b) it's in 3D. Let me clear the first thing up straightaway. Cameron is Executive Producer, not the director, and while it may have been his influence that caused most of the actors to spend most of the time underwater, the script, for once, is not his liability. And he probably would have hired some more expensive actors. The 3D I'll return to in a minute.
What we have here is a hard-nosed cave-diver called Frank (Richard Roxburgh), his son Josh, his financial backer Carl (Ioan Gruffudd), Carl's girlfriend, and a couple of other superfluous blokes whose principal function is to meet a tragic (and wet) end. This assorted crew is trapped underground by a flash flood that has been signalled extensively for some time before it happens. The upshot of which is that they have to try and find Another Way Out - mostly underwater, but with a certain amount of cliff-climbing thrown in. That premise might have been enough to make an adventure yarn, but the poor film has had electrodes attached to its chest, and a few thousand volts jolted through it, by injecting a Melodrama into its veins (sorry about the mixed medical metaphor). So we not only have a father/son thing going on, but also an alpha male dong-waving contest as well. The patient never recovers, and instead of a high budget Touching The Void/127 Hours, we end up with a greasy hamburger with double helpings of cheese, mostly supplied by Frank, channelling Crocodile Dundee without the laughs, and Carl (what was Gruffudd thinking of?) trying to commit career hara kiri on screen.
And then there's the 3D. I don't know what the film would be like in 2D, because I haven't seen it in that format. It couldn't be any worse, and probably wouldn't be any better. My point is that a film is neither improved nor diminished by 3D; it just makes it more expensive (to watch as well as to film). A film is only as good as its script, and this one seems to be have penned by a writer with both sides of his brain missing. Everything is obvious, cliched, trite and predictable, not just the characters but also their behaviour, the narrative and the endless bloody shots of people diving under water with or without breathing equipment, or scaling impassable rocks with their bare hands. Lots of people die - nearly everyone, in fact - but it's impossible to care one way or the other, because they never existed in the first place. They are simply names and faces who have been told to say and do stupid things, until something Bad happens to them.
Taking a deep breath, I'm trying to think of a single good thing to say about the film, in the spirit of fairmindedness. Long pause... Well, it's under 2 hours long (though it feels longer); erm, the caves look spectacular (though not as spectacular as the ones in Cave Of Forgotten Dreams, coming soon in 3D). And that's about it. I don't think it would even be showing at a multiplex near you, were it not for Cameron's name being branded on its arse. But don't worry, it'll be gone before you know it.
