47 Meters Down: Uncaged
47 METERS DOWN: UNCAGED - Entertainment Studios
Director Johannes Roberts follows up his 2017 underground hit 47 Meters Down with a sequel appropriately titled 47 Meters Down: Uncaged. The film follows a group of teenage girls who stumble on ancient underwater ruins. Their curiosity gets the better of them, and they dive deep to explore - only to meet an unexpected guest who has them on the menu.
What made Johannes Robert's surprisingly eventful horror work was that it had no expectation, famously avoiding a close call with the direct-to-video market. This time around, with a significant interest with a core audience, Robert's film has to surprise and evolve, yet find a balance of giving the audience what they want. All in all, it succeeds in providing on all three elements in ranging proficiency.
The screenplay utilised here, sadly, is nothing short of abysmal. It is neither organic nor authentic for the target audience to watch; the characters are delivering lines that would not even slip out of a "woke" sixty-five-year-olds mouth. The dialogue is continuously abrasive alongside the dynamic between the group and is the biggest obstacle for the audience to cross. It does not flow or exhibit believability with any real chemistry to be found. The result is an awkward stance of clumsy delivery that is not digested very well between the group to cause engagement and only suffices to reflect the incredibly weak identity found in the screenplay from writer-director Johannes Roberts and co-writer Ernest Riera.
Writing and screenplay aside, the film visually stands out with some strong qualities. The tension and atmosphere found in its predecessor is also here tenfold. It is suitably claustrophobic and tense with tight execution of camera angles from cinematographer Mark Silk that intensifies the terror and playfully explores the horror with superb usage of editing by Martin Brinkler that lingers on reactionary terror and thankfully limits the screen time of the unseen monsters lurking in the deep. However, it is quite clear that when the monsters themselves are shown as the CGI work is quite underwhelming.
The casting also causes a slight note for concern. The personification of nepotism screams from the screen here. This film is not only the feature film debut of Sistine Stallone, daughter of action star Sylvester Stallone, but also the debut film of Corinne Foxx, daughter of Jamie Foxx. The two in their debuts are stiff and lifeless with how they craft their respective characters. Stallone, in particular, is out of her depth here and is perhaps a little too early to throw herself in this medium without a portfolio of work to help her evolve as an actress. Foxx holds a little bit of emotional weight here, but her delivery is ill-advised and oversimplified. Granted, both performances are the beginning of their careers, but it begs the question: would they even be here on talent alone? It will be up to the viewer to decipher, but thankfully the performances of Sophie Nélisse and Brianne Tju inject a great deal of profound skill in their depiction of thematic intensity in every scene that their characters grow in an organic and life-like manner.
47 Meters Down: Uncaged was released in cinemas across the U.S. on August 16th, 2019.
