47 Meters Down Movie Review

By: Lynn Barker

In 47 Meters Down, when conservative Lisa (Mandy Moore) and her more free-spirited sis Kate (Claire Holt) go all “Girls Gone Wild” on their Mexican beach vacay, somebody will surely live to regret some poor choices. When things go horribly wrong on a cage shark viewing dive, will it be Kate who saves the day or can Lisa find her mojo and step it up to achieve heroine status?

Strolling the beach in paradise

Sisters Gone Wild

On a Mexican vacation, Kate tries to get her sis Lisa to loosen up and party. Lisa admits that her boyfriend Stuart just dumped her because she’s well…too boring. On Kate’s dare, after dancing, drinking and meeting two hot Mexican guys, Lisa agrees to proving Stuart wrong by joining Kate in going out to sea, donning SCUBA equipment and getting in a cage which will be lowered to about 5 meters underwater so the occupants can see some huge sharks up close. Yikes!

Suiting Up with Captain Taylor

Rusty Cage

Out on the weathered dive boat with Captain Taylor (Matthew Modine) and party boys Javier (Chris J. Johnson) and Louis (Yani Gellman), Lisa starts to back out but is talked into suiting up and getting into a somewhat rusty cage with Kate after the boys have illegally chummed (thrown fish parts and blood) into the water and drawn a 20-foot shark and his buddies. Only Kate has taken any SCUBA classes. Lisa is a total newbie to diving. It’s frightening especially when one of the boys teases with “Hey, you know sharks can hear your heartbeat”.

A big shark circles the cage

Here Fishy Fishy

At first, Lisa is getting into seeing pretty fish up close and thinks this might be fun after all then, whoops, the winch that attaches the cage to the boat to lower it slips, breaks and the cage and sisters plummet from 5 meters to 47… the bottom of the ocean which is deep enough to give you the Bends (decompression sickness creating air bubbles in your brain) causing death if you don’t surface very, very slowly.

A shark gets ready to attack

Out of Touch

The microphones inside the girls’ diving masks don’t work this deep so they can’t hear the captain or anything from the boat above. With the broken winch equipment fallen on top of their cage, they can’t swim out. Sharks are now circling the cage. Kate manages to exit and swim up to a depth where the captain can hear her. She’s told Javier is coming down with a spare winch to hoist them up with along with spare air tanks.  Of course staying down long enough to go through two air tanks will give you nitrogen narcosis (a dizzy, drowsy and totally hallucinogenic state in which you see things that aren’t real!) After a while, the sisters see Javier’s flashlight but he isn’t coming closer to the cage! While waiting, Lisa admits to Kate that she was always jealous of her and the only thing she had that guy-hopping Kate didn’t was Stuart, her committed relationship. Kate seems clueless that Lisa was ever jealous of her.

Will we survive down here?

Shark Attack!

A really big shark butts his head and teeth against the cage until he bends the bars but doesn’t get in. The sisters start running out of air. With Kate closer to the no air mark, it’s Lisa who bravely goes out to follow Javier’s flashlight so they can get new air tanks. She becomes disoriented in the water. What is up, what is down? Somehow, I don’t think this will end well.  Will a sister run out of air? Will somebody be a shark snack? Will Lisa Wonder Woman-up and save the day or is this tropical vacay ending in tragedy?

Lisa is terrified!

Wrapping Up

We saw 47 Meters Down on a IMAX screen which helps immerse you in the deep.  Using the big SCUBA masks on the leads rather than tiny mask, pass-the-regulator equipment makes for a better view of terror on the human face. When things go terribly wrong you will be asking yourself “Would I panic and use up all my air too quickly?” In my case, sadly, yep!

Claire and Mandy in the tank on set

The film’s underwater cinematography is very good, starting with the director’s foreboding imagery of a very red Cosmopolitan cocktail resembling blood in the water being spilled into a party pool. Minimal music is used in favor of ambient sound as the girls breathe and freak out. Very effective.

Mandy and Claire on the beach with their directorCourtesy of Entertainment Studios Motion Pictures

Some of the dialogue is kind of hokey but we’re not talking “Sharknado” here. There are some lapses in logic (uh, somebody who can’t use it, has a spare air tank.. could you grab it? Evidently not). However, there is enough character development, tension and edge-of-you-seat terror to keep you interested and a twist ending I didn’t see coming although some of you may.

Should we do this?

Overall, 47 Meters Down is way more fun than I expected. Mandy and Claire both do fine jobs of convincing us of their characters. You will probably dig the film. Some teen girls next to me said they got so riveted to the film that they forgot to eat their popcorn! We can go at least 3 stars.

47 Meters Down Movie Rating: 

47 Meters Down PosterCourtesy of Entertainment Studios Motion Pictures

See 47 Meters Down in theaters now!

Have Your Say

Do you enjoy summer water adventures? Are you afraid of sharks or do you think they are actually cool? How brave would you be if trapped underwater? Leave your opinion below with a comment.