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'Submergence'

Skip. Swipe left. Water torture in film form.

By Leia HallfikPublished 6 years ago 3 min read
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James (James McAvoy) and Danny (Alicia Vikander) meet at a hotel on the coast of France where they supposedly fall passionately for each other before going on their respective missions. James is a British spy preparing for a mission in Somalia and Danny is a bio-statistician preparing for a career-changing deep-sea dive.

I really wanted to like this movie.

I was so excited for it.

I waited for it to come out.

James McAvoy (Atonement, Last King of Scotland, X-Men franchise... I could go on and on). I love him. He's Scottish. He's perfect.

Alicia Vikander (Ex Machina, The Danish Girl, Lara Croft). She's... well a little boring to be honest—but she's talented. An Oscar winner... and Swedish.

What could go wrong?

Everything apparently. This is not your next binge. You will want to submerge your head in water. It's absolute water torture (apologies to any victims of torture for that comparison, but it’s bad. Real bad).

Two beautiful actors with absolutely zero chemistry. Did McAvoy not want to offend his bro Michael Fassbender by filming a believable romance with Fassbender's girl? I doubt it. But the romance was unbelievably dead. Muerto. When I feel like you’re forcing me to believe you’re passionately in love, something has gone wrong.

This was one of the flattest performances I’ve seen from Alicia Vikander. Her character as a nerdy biostatistician wasn’t completely believable but completely boring, droning on and on about levels of the ocean and how ground-breaking her work will be. Yay you. Get those publications, girl. But snooze. I’m all for smart ladies, but show some enthusiasm. Use some facial expressions.

And then there’s the terrorism. Yes, terrorism. What on earth was director Wim Wenders trying to achieve with the terrorism plot? Instead of your stereotypical Arab or brown-skinned terrorist, we head to Somalia with some Al-Shabaab looking terrorists (yay for diversity??). Points for maybe attempting to show some dimensional portrayal of terrorists with Alexander Siddig’s character Dr. Shadid and his conversations with James. Points deducted for some very sensationalist plot points. Sadly, this film won’t further any discussion. Primarily because no one would want to finish watching this movie. And because the whole concept doesn’t seem like it was fleshed out completely.

Alleged romance (I still don't believe it) and terrorism. A match made in underwater submarine graveyards.

Were there any upsides to this movie? I had to think hard. Really hard. I’ve come up with two. You’re welcome. If these are enough to induce you to watch this film, well… you’re free to do whatever you want with your time.

One? Breathtaking beauty of the scenery off the coast of Normandy (where the beautiful luxury hotel is located) and the Faroe Islands (a stopover for our biostatistician deep sea scientist Alicia/Danny). One of the few almost redeeming qualities of this film. If you’re a lover of travel, maybe have the film on, muted, as you cook dinner or wash the dishes.

Two? James McAvoy in his jeans. I’m serious.

A+ for filling out your jeans. Someone doesn’t skip leg day.

No seriously, kudos to McAvoy for his brilliant acting as usual, despite a horrific script. Without posting any spoilers, some of James’ scenes with the terrorists are absolutely harrowing. His acting as a British spy posing as a water engineer (very white savior) was quite believable. If I was a foreigner digging wells in an African country, I would be scared of being hauled in for questioning. Thankfully, not enough people could bear to watch this film.

But alas, even James McAvoy in jeans can't save this film for a Titanic-esque ending.

Final Verdict: Big fat SKIP. A one-way submarine ride down to obscurity.

It could have been so good....

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About the Creator

Leia Hallfik

Your typical impatient millennial. Losing precious sleep to binge watch sometimes glorious sometimes mediocre television. I review TV shows and movies so you don't have to waste your precious time with endless scrolling for your next binge.

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