Beneath (2013)

Great Film overall

A Major Disappointment

I really wanted to like this movie. I feel terribly cynical trashing it, and that's why I'm giving it a middling 5. Actually, I'm giving it a 5 because there were some superb performances.

It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

Beneath (2013, Larry Fessenden) has a set of highly obnoxious characters who are whittled down to the irredeemable few by a large catfish.There are good things about this film, they are: 1. The catfish; although not at all anatomically correct it is striking and the plus is that it is a prop, not CGI, which makes it physically imposing.2. I personally like that the film is almost entirely in daylight. It's a brave move because it means the monster is shown in daylight, so you see it clearly when it is on the screen. I prefer my Godzilla fights during the day, so why not my attacking fish.That's it. Here are the bad points: 1. The characters are sickening. I don't go in for this "let's make these people total trash so we all want to see them die!" rubbish. Wasn't Bradford Dillman and Heather Menzies a good duo in Piranha? Weren't Fred Ward and Kevin Bacon a good team in Tremors? Wasn't Sigourney Weaver just great in the Alien films? 2. The music is poor. It floats around like it's from another film. Music is supposed to be a reflection of what's happening on screen and what we as viewers are meant to be feeling. This generated virtually no tension whatsoever.3. The story line. It's basically a version of The Raft, a segment of Creepshow 2, where a bunch of annoying people hang out on a raft only to be picked off one by one by a thing in the water.4. The filming lacks energy and creativity.This film seems to have been made by people who were not interested in making a horror film at all, but yet were retro enough to not go down the CGI route, which appeases people like me, and yet they did go down the route of not caring about plot and characterisation- the not caring of which typically goes hand in hand with CGI monsters, so it's a total disaster.I watched it once and liked what I liked. I will not be watching this film again.It gets a 4 because of the catfish and the daylight!

The oversized antagonist of this run of the mill creature feature isn't a bad specimen and definitely looks like something out of the River Monsters alumni, not too far beyond realistic proportions. But that's about all I can praise in this otherwise irritating labour as six high school seniors try to stay afloat a sinking row boat as they're stalked by the voracious lake monster whilst tensions amongst the group threaten their survival.Most of the characters are clichés (the nerd, the jock, the outsider) and some are plainly irritating, not to mention uneven as the plot meanders from one fatality to the next. It doesn't take long for this lemon to lose its zest, the brittle relationships deteriorating into ridiculous scenarios that accelerate the attrition rate beyond I'm sure even the appetite of the assailant. Aside from the abysmal acting and puerile dialogue, the key weakness in the plot is the fact that the riverbank is clearly visible in almost every shot, yet despite their obvious proximity to shore, these directionless debutantes never seem to get any closer to it. Had they been depicted further from land in a vast lake, the situation would've been more believable. Unlike the typical monster movie, there's a rather morbid conclusion to this aimless outing, though it doesn't necessarily redeem the previous 80-minutes which even by B-movie standards is pretty mediocre.

This film was awful 1.the one I didn't want to die she died and 2.Jonny died and that was the main character it was a stupid death and a bad ending to him it was ridiculous,this film was a awful story line it needed to be more realistic instead of stupid deaths and mostly all the same,more needs to happen in this...Jonny should have stayed alive from the start to finish and show the life of him when he gets back on land and telling people what had happened.... Good ending because I didn't like the brother (Simon) but other than that it was utter crap and it's also very bad acting,saying that,that's what you expect for a not so popular film !!!

A gaggle of teenagers who've just graduated high school go on a rural excursion together before they all head their separate ways. They end up on a boat, on a lake, and at least one of their number, Johnny (Daniel Zovatto), seems to know the score. He's heard "legends" regarding the place. As it turns out, this dumb bunch ends up stranded on the boat - which develops leaks - and franticly trying to make it to shore when a goofy monster fish shows up and, every so often, gobbles up one of them.It's a shame, really. You expect more from writer / director / editor Larry Fessenden ("Habit", "Wendigo") than this kind of cheese ball entertainment. It seems as if he's trying to rise it above most of the efforts in this genre by ruminating on the idea of the depths to which people will sink when it comes to saving their own worthless lives. How much does friendship and family count for in such a situation?Negating whatever honest intentions Fessenden may have had is the fact that this is one truly despicable bunch of jerks. This is the kind of movie where you root for the monster, by default, to eat everybody because there's not one human character on hand that's tolerable. Zeke (Griffin Newman) is one of the worst because he's a walking cliché: the kind of film geek / aspiring filmmaker who stubbornly insists on filming everything, the kind of guy who drives this viewer right up the wall.The acting is pretty bad from most everybody concerned, which doesn't help matters. The young cast is amateurish, with just one old pro present: veteran character actor Mark Margolis ("Pi", 'Breaking Bad'), who has just two scenes.The design for the monster fish is, as was said, rather goofy, but the visual effects are better than one might expect; the fish actually feels like a physical presence in the movie. And there is a smattering of amusing gore throughout.This isn't one that this viewer would really recommend, unless you have a high tolerance for bad writing and bad acting.Four out of 10.