The Shallows

Name(s): The Shallows
Release Date(s): June 21, 2016

I was offered to watch either The Shallows or Free State of Jones. I thought this one sounded more up my alley. Blake Lively visits a secluded beach for a wild day of surfing, getting too close to a great white shark. Stranded on a rock far from shore, she has to use survival skills and strategy in order to live. At the same time, she’s trapped as the shark circles around her.

It’s great to see another honest attempt at a shark movie after the genre has spent so much time being parodying itself. Usually, shitty parodies of itself. I love Jaws, and I’m sure I’ll bring it up again. It’s literally the only passable shark movie I’ve seen other than The Shallows. They’re about as different as they can be though, despite both being natural thrillers.

The biggest difference is Jaws has more of a focus on plot and characters. Not to its detriment, since it sells the climax’s dramatic weight. You’ve spent the rest of Jaws seeing the trio as ordinary people deciding to battle a monster threatening their home. The Shallows is more like a circumstantial single-setting thriller with very little dialogue. Lively talks to herself sometimes, but in a reasonable enough frequency that doesn’t feel forced. The only company she has is one of cinema’s new classic characters, The Seagull, who plays himself.

Visual Style

My favorite part of this movie is the look of it. Despite the terror lurking under the water there’s heavy color saturation and the ocean looks crystal clear and relaxing. It’s an interesting choice, but the smooth aqua breeze that cover’s the movies atmosphere allows this thriller’s slow speed to feel welcome and comfortable rather than a slog. The moments of horror and suspense are punctuated well enough to not diminish them.

The color scheme is almost universally blues and greens, punctuating blood, and the ocean feels both open and oppressive. Some grey tones take over as the movie goes on, which I think is to match Lively’s pale, dehydrated skin. It’s a bit of an eclipse over how close she’s getting to death. By the time this happens, you’re near the climax, so for the most part this movie actually has a pretty refreshing vibe to it. I like this. I can see how it’d be controversial because certain scenes (especially in the beginning) almost feel like a summer Aquafina commercial, but I think it gives it a sense of style that it may not have stood out enough without.

Music

There’s some pretty good use of music too. I preferred it in the beginning when it was sticking to an electronic synthwave score. It syncs up with the ocean, which helps it aid that crystalline atmosphere I mentioned above. But I think it’s unfortunate that they switch to a more token, classical score after the introduction. Before this happened, I was getting a kind of neon, contemporary Drive-inspired aesthetic, which I thought was a pretty cool stylistic choice.

Fortunately, the classical score still goes along with the serene landscaping shots of the ocean, and its mostly sustained chords wash over the cinematography rather than something aggressive like the Jaws theme. This is important because the obvious thing to do in a lot of these calm scenes would be to not use music to tease the impending threat. Instead, they have a dynamic going between respite and danger.

Pacing Issues in The Shallows

Regarding the thrills themselves, I have mixed feelings. I always found this engrossing, but it seems to try both being a plausible survival thriller and an extreme action-thriller at the same time. It’s both methodical and sensationalist, always switching between moments that highlight one or the other.

When I got out of the theater I realized this might’ve been intentional, since the movie continuously lets you know whether the current tide is high or low. I think the high tide moments may have foreshadowed action scenes while the low were the slow, survival bits. I could be overthinking it. It’s just a thought. Assuming that I’m wrong about this, I’m still kind of sympathetic to the inconsistent tone of a lot of scenes. There’s a bit of a surrealness to it how it switches from some near-fantasy imagery to horror, and all of these quirks help give it character.

The Shallows Verdict

In the end, I think The Shallows doesn’t have the best chemistry or amazing dramatic tension, but its strange decisions give it personality that make it stand out among an oversaturated niche of garbage shark movies. It’s something that has a certain appeal, but I think it’s held back from being even better because it’s both not stylish/hyper-realistic enough nor plausible/empathetic enough to sell the thrills. It’s just solid in the end.