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In the first film, “47 Meters Down,” Mandy Moore and Claire Holt portray sisters who go on a boat tour promising close shark encounters. A tour that quickly goes awry when they find themselves stuck in a cage on the ocean floor surrounded by CGI sharks. Moore and Holt find themselves deep on the ocean floor with a damaged tank. To make matters worse, they have way too many meters to the surface, way too many CGI sharks, and not enough air to breathe. There was a time when No one wanted to watch this film, but two years ago, it made its way to theaters. The film turned out to be as bad as it was projected to be. The unimaginative premise, along with lackluster performances from Moore and Holt, resulted in a mundane plot consumed by banal shock moments and one of the stupidest endings to ever exist. Out of nowhere, this film found a way to become a sleeper hit.
So, just like that, “47 Meters Down Uncaged” is out, and it is rather ironic that this one was always meant for the theaters because, with its B minus-level cast, horrible visual effects, and a story that is so much worse than the long list of shark-themed movies that came before it, this is the one movie that appears to be a straight to video movie that somehow appeared in theaters in hope of getting some dollars from frustrated mid-summer crowds.
Given how little of the cast from the first movie is left alive, it would be rather absurd to assume they could build up a sequel around the pathetic misadventures of Matthew Modine’s boat captain. But “Uncaged” has no narrative connection to its predecessor. For example, one could argue that it could work as an unconnected story similar to how Oscar Wilde would use multiple perspectives, “To lose one group of ninnies to sharks may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose two looks like carelessness”. In Mexico set sequel, Sophie Nelisse takes center stage as an American Mia who moves to Mexico with her father John Corbett, an undersea explorer, his new wife Nia Long, and stepsister Sasha, Corinne Fox. Sasha effortlessly is unable to defend Mia from school mean girls who bully her without any reason. On the next day, Sasha and Mia’s dad aims to have the sisters bond so he buys them tickets for a glass-bottomed boat ride, however, Sasha’s friends Alexa and Nicole have a different plan. Sasha ditches her father’s plan and decides to bring Mia along for the ride instead.
The best knowledge is a remote lagoon next to the entrance of an underwater Mayan city that Mia’s dad recently discovered. Luckily, his research team has left four sets of scuba gear that the four of them plan to use to take a look at the city’s first entrance point. This starts off as amusing, but then when one of them is attacked by a fish while scuba diving, they panic and inspire a chain reaction that breaks a significant portion of the entrance off and traps them underwater. This allows a great white shark to emerge as a blind, emaciated shark from spending too much time in the limp underwater. Now, the four of them are forced to navigate the increasingly strangled environment without any remaining oxygen and a cranky shark pursuing them ready to devour the four of them. From time to time other characters appear, but they’re destined to die so their appearances are trivial.
Even the most dedicated fans of Mandy Moore would not consider “47 Metres Down” a good movie by any metric, but at least it interacted with the viewers all right (up until the horrific ending, of course). The characters were given all the opportunities to help themselves at least a little which was a nice touch. Co-writers Johannes Roberts and Ernest Riera did not return, because the borderline clever ideas they once had to keep the audience interested have run out, so now this story requires everyone to act like a complete moron at every moment to get from Point A to A. There are no new ideas here, the only innovation seems to be that the two spend as much time copying “The Descent” as they do every single shark movie. Speaking of innovations, one of the latter stolen ideas is so blatant that I can hardly believe how bold it is.
When it comes to the characters, they are so lacking in actual traits that once they descend underwater and slip their scuba helmets on, it is virtually impossible to tell them apart at any contact.
Just like many underwater films, this one is not appealing at all, and it severely lacks visual attractiveness. Roberts attempts a decent water-based attack sequence, but the musical accompaniment works against it. This serves as an echo to the acidic sequence of “The Strangers Prey At Night,” which was Roberts’ only memorable piece. Ironically, everything aside from the ending is nonsensical. But at least, the endings are laughable enough to bring energy into what would otherwise be a dull atmosphere.
I have become the go-to person for this site whenever there’s a movie that requires a shark to eat a person. In the grander scheme of this sub-genre, “47 Meters Down: Uncaged” ranks somewhere in the middle it is nowhere as good as ‘Jaws’ (or even Jaws 2) but it’s a good deal better than whatever shark-related nonsense is on SyFy channel right now as I write this. If for some bizarre reason, you are deathly keen on seeing this, then waiting for it to show up on SyFy in a few months might be your best option. You do not stand to lose anything visually, and the commercials will at least offer some distraction from the tedium.
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