INTO THE BLUE(PG-13)
**1/2 (out of 5)
September 30, 2005
STARRING
Paul Walker as JARED
Jessica Alba as SAM
Scott Caan as BRYCE
Ashley Scott as AMANDA
Josh Brolin as BATES
Studio: Columbia Pictures/MGM
Directed by: John Stockwell
BY KEVIN CARR
Listen to Kevin’s radio review…
The new thriller-on-the-water “Into the Blue” has been on the MGM slate of films to be released for more than a year. Then MGM and its upcoming releases were sold to Sony Pictures, and it was delayed again. However, MGM did promote the film nicely. They even sent me a calendar of the movie, and the bikini-clad Jessica Alba has been gracing the wall of my office for most of the year.
To be honest, this was the only reason I was eager to see this movie. After all, it’s Jessica Alba… in a bikini… swimming in the ocean. ‘Nuff said.
Finally, the film has been released, and it is living up to its hype – at least the kind of hype that involves the stars of the movie in swimsuits.
“Into the Blue” is a remake of the Peter Benchley film “The Deep,” although you wouldn’t know that from watching the marketing of the film. The film is about a group of divers who stumble across a crashed plane full of cocaine. Nearby, they are also searching for a sunken treasure from a supposedly mythical vessel from the 1860s.
In order to claim the bounty of treasure, they have to identify the ship. However, if they give up the location of the downed coke plane, they’ll also inadvertently give up the location of the sunken ship. And if this happens, every treasure hunter from the islands to the mainland is going to come looking for the ship that’s rightfully theirs.
But all of these plot issues don’t really matter. What matters is that the sexy stars of this movie are swimming around in skimpy swimsuits through much of the first half of the film. I know. I’m a pig. Oink, oink.
But let’s not kid ourselves. The suspense plot is pretty weak, and the characters make some of the lamest choices I’ve seen in my career of watching films. So much of their problems could have been avoided if they would have just had half a brain.
But it’s not the brains that’s selling this film. The filmmakers are capitalizing on their assets extremely well. Let’s just say the scenery is incredible. Oh, and it was shot in the Bahamas, so the locations are pretty sweet too.
However, once the cast puts their clothes back on, things really start to break down. They sometimes know things that they should have no way of knowing. Other times, they put themselves in needless danger simply because the characters are too stupid to walk and chew gum at the same time. But then again, no one is expecting Shakespeare when it comes to this movie.
There are movies out there that are run-of-the-mill action movies with plenty of cliches and unoriginal plot points. I’m reminded of movies like “Cellular,” “Mindhunters” and “Hostage.” However, the story to “Into the Blue” isn’t as good as even these movies. But for a movie filled with a lot of eye candy (which, sadly, is probably this film’s biggest draw), you can do a lot worse.
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