Thoughts on the film Underwater and small town video shops.

Having been stationed in Narrabri, New South Wales for work purposes I have been taking full advantage of the local video shop. Yep, that’s right, in 2020 there is still a video shop in Narrabri.
Upon learning this fact my level of respect for this town went stratospheric. I mean, I come from a town with a higher population of people than Narrabri and we don’t have a video shop. Yes, much respect is deserved for a town for holding onto its video shop and even more respect is due for managing to keep its doors open.
Trying to find this elusive video shop was an experience on its own. At first I simply googled Video Ezy Narrabri and I was given an address and phone number. I wasn’t game enough to simply call, I have been lead astray many times before, especially because I still did not fully believe that this mythical video shop actually existed. So, in true exploration fashion I decided to go on an adventure to find the shop on foot. Sounds easy, right? Well, actually, no. The first night in town I simply could not find the store, even with google maps open. Turns out, I was on the wrong side of the street and the store itself was no longer a Video Ezy, it was a nameless video shop without any signs indicating that it was a video shop at all. In fact, to complicate things further still, the video shop itself was a shop within a shop. The name of the shop it was enclosed in was called Shop 2390, turns out this is the postcode of the township itself. Eventually I asked a checkout attendant at the local Coles supermarket for directions. She replied “we have a video shop, but it’s not Video Ezy. It used to be. It’s down next to the Tatts”. What ever the hell that means I thought. I travelled back down the street and I finally found it. It was a multi faceted buisness which sold lottery tickets, scratch its, tobacco products and a variety of gifts. This immediately explained how they had managed to keep their doors open. There’s nothing quite like knowing that the reason your local video shop is still open is because of gambling and tobacco. Whatever the case, the video shop section itself was at the back of the shop and it was the stuff of my dreams. (No joke, I have actually dreamed of going to the video shop...many times). The store provided a good variety of new releases and a well stocked library of weekly rentals with all the classics, except for Psycho which I soon discovered had sadly been moved to the ex-rental section for $3.00, what a travesty...The shop also sold video game consoles, controllers and games. PS4 and Xbox were both well supported, the Nintendo Switch however was sadly neglected. Surprisingly I did find a Nintendo Wii U game hidden in the used games section that I snapped up for a neat $5.00. The game was Kirby and the Rainbow Curse or as it is known in Australia Kirby and the Rainbow Paintbrush. Turns out it was well worth the five dollars. I will write a review for this game soon.
I have always enjoyed the experience of visiting the video store. During the 80’s, 90’s and 2000’s it was simply one of my favourite past times. I would spend hours walking amongst the shelves trying to search for the perfect movie for the mood I was in. Side note - Mood is how I mentally classify movies. The emotion different films draw from me allows me to categorise them. As you may have already guessed, video shops meant and still do mean so much to me. Therefore having a video shop within walking distance was simply something I could not pass up. I have been sure to walk down each evening to rent a movie while I still can. I’m even content with paying the over-dues if I need to. I am simply delighted to be able to experience the video shop again. With all of today’s streaming internet services video shops have become a rarity indeed. With the way things are going there’s always a real chance that this could be the final experience of the video shop that I might have the privilege of enjoying. Thanks must be given to Shop 2390 for giving me a chance to soak up the video shop experience once more!
So, with having said all that, on the second night after arriving I rented The Lighthouse, I have also posted a review for this that you can find further down the blog entries. I kept this film for two nights, which resulted in the over-dues I mentioned further up. On the fourth night I decided to rent the sci-fi thriller Underwater.
This is finally the point of the article where I will review the movie as mentioned in the title of this entry. If you’ve made it this far into the article, good for you :)
I went into the film Underwater having heard good things. I have friends who have watched the movie and they gave very excited reviews. After having watched the film it was clear that these friends of mine were simply content that someone had pieced together a flick reminiscent of the films they grew up with.
When I first watched the preview for Underwater I was instantly reminded of such classics as The Abyss, Alien, and Sphere and I figured Underwater would be very similar. I wasn’t far wrong. Turns out the Director William Eubank was born in 1982. While the screen writers were also born in the late 70’s and 80’s. It is clear from the films storyline that they were exposed and inspired by these genre specific films. And that’s a good thing. There’s nothing wrong with making a good sci-fi thriller that pays homage to past classics and this was Underwater’s strongest hand. It’s budget was it’s other strength.
The storyline was interesting enough. An ocean floor oil drilling station experiences an earthquake and as a result begins to implode under the pressure of the deep waters surrounding it. The lead actress Norah played by a cleverly disguised Kristen Stewart races against the forces of pressure to escape the imploding station. Along the way she meets up with the stations captain Lucien and several other well formed and some times eccentric characters. Norahs plan is to get to the escape pods and leave the depths before herself and her fellow crew members are swallowed up by the ocean. The story from this point leads the viewers through the wreckage of the breached station, this is perhaps the films weakest hand. The claustrophobic atmosphere that made The Abyss such an enduring thriller failed to materialise. More pressure is added to the storyline when the group has a realisation that there’s something in the darkness of the murky ocean bottom that happens to be picking off the crew members one by one. Disaster film to monster film. Underwater was entertaining fun, although it did manage to become confusing at times, especially when the survivors were in the murky sediment of the ocean floor. This tended to leave the viewer unsure as to what exactly was going on. Whether this was the intention or not remains to be “seen”.
Underwater did manage to make a sea story feel like a space story and that was, I believe, the creators ultimate goal. The film lead the viewer to compare the immensity of the ocean to the immensity of space. A realisation for the viewer occurs while watching the film that if alien life does indeed exist somewhere out there than why couldn’t it already exist on earth, on the ocean floor? While viewing the movie it becomes obvious that the deep ocean is indeed an alien landscape to us humans.
Put simply humans do not belong in the depths of the ocean. But perhaps Cthulhu does?

6 octopi arms out of 8.


Underwater can be purchased online here.

​