Underwater
Nov. 9th, 2020 11:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
iariaI liked it.
+ I like that it immediately jumps into the action with basically no set up.
+ Loved the Cthulhu reveal at the end.
+ I liked Norah. I absolutely thought she was going to be the Final Girl but while I would have liked her to survive I ended up loving how things ended with her. She went out like a badass.
+ I liked Norah's journey against feeling helpless and being unable to save people. The whole movie is her losing people and being unable to save them - the two crew members during the explosion, Rodrigo to implosion, Paul to the creatures, Lucien to decompression/the creatures. But through each death she keeps moving forward, keeps pushing and trying and then in the end she succeeds. She saves two of her friends and kills the creatures and it feels very triumphant even if she has to die doing it.
I knew going in there was an alternate ending and after watching both I find I like both a lot. What I like about the deleted one is: Norah using her engineering knowledge (just as she did at the beginning of the film) to save herself, Norah's necklace coming into play (she fidgeted with it multiple times during the movie and I kept expecting it to be important), and Norah not giving up trying to survive (as she did through the entire movie). The actual ending was badass and great but I think I prefer the deleted one.
+ Emily was my biggest surprise. When it started with her (understandably) scared and helpless, and her constant screaming I thought I knew where the character was going and was annoyed. Instead she ended up being the character with an arc and I was so proud of her when it was revealed that she'd continued to drag Smith across the ocean floor by herself after the others had been dragged off. It was such a great little 'yes' reveal. And then on top of that when Norah gets attacked by the creatures she not only drags Smith into the hatch but she then goes back to get Norah! And then saves her life again by getting her out of the suit. I loved it. I loved her.
+ Norah/Emily ended up being my favourite relationship.
+ I appreciate that it was one of the guys that ended up spending the entire latter half of the movie being the damsel in distress.
+ Emily and Smith being in a relationship felt tacked on. Clearly it was there to contrast with Norah's loss but it was given so little thought or screentime that it could have been easily removed with no change.
+ I spent a lot of time mentally sighing over Norah spending the movie in a bra instead of a shirt and then again when everyone had to strip down to their underwear and both women ended up being in skimpy underwear while the guys were more covered. That said I liked that there were no lingering close-ups and the one we got was of Paul's ass. It didn't feel as exploitative as it could have.
+ I was surprised that more deaths didn't happen because of the creatures though I did like that the environment proved to be as dangerous to the crew as the creatures themselves.
+ I can't believe they actually killed the black guy first. That is not a movie horror trope that should be followed. They should have switched Rodrigo's actor with Smith or Paul's actor.
+ I wonder if we were supposed to think Rodrigo gave Norah the good helmet and kept a defective one for himself? It seemed like it was hinting at that. I actually don't mind it if that's true because as he said at the beginning - she knew how to save them when he had no idea. Him realising that only one of them could survive and making the self-sacrificing play because her skills/knowledge would give the group as a whole a better chance of survival was great. It just should have been more textual. Especially because in the end she was the reason there were survivors and she ends up doing the same thing herself.
+ I was surprised that we didn't get more from Emily, the biologist, about this new unknown species. If you're going to have a biologist character (totally not necessary in the movie) and introduce a new species I feel like you should do something with it.
+ I like that it immediately jumps into the action with basically no set up.
+ Loved the Cthulhu reveal at the end.
+ I liked Norah. I absolutely thought she was going to be the Final Girl but while I would have liked her to survive I ended up loving how things ended with her. She went out like a badass.
+ I liked Norah's journey against feeling helpless and being unable to save people. The whole movie is her losing people and being unable to save them - the two crew members during the explosion, Rodrigo to implosion, Paul to the creatures, Lucien to decompression/the creatures. But through each death she keeps moving forward, keeps pushing and trying and then in the end she succeeds. She saves two of her friends and kills the creatures and it feels very triumphant even if she has to die doing it.
I knew going in there was an alternate ending and after watching both I find I like both a lot. What I like about the deleted one is: Norah using her engineering knowledge (just as she did at the beginning of the film) to save herself, Norah's necklace coming into play (she fidgeted with it multiple times during the movie and I kept expecting it to be important), and Norah not giving up trying to survive (as she did through the entire movie). The actual ending was badass and great but I think I prefer the deleted one.
+ Emily was my biggest surprise. When it started with her (understandably) scared and helpless, and her constant screaming I thought I knew where the character was going and was annoyed. Instead she ended up being the character with an arc and I was so proud of her when it was revealed that she'd continued to drag Smith across the ocean floor by herself after the others had been dragged off. It was such a great little 'yes' reveal. And then on top of that when Norah gets attacked by the creatures she not only drags Smith into the hatch but she then goes back to get Norah! And then saves her life again by getting her out of the suit. I loved it. I loved her.
+ Norah/Emily ended up being my favourite relationship.
+ I appreciate that it was one of the guys that ended up spending the entire latter half of the movie being the damsel in distress.
+ Emily and Smith being in a relationship felt tacked on. Clearly it was there to contrast with Norah's loss but it was given so little thought or screentime that it could have been easily removed with no change.
+ I spent a lot of time mentally sighing over Norah spending the movie in a bra instead of a shirt and then again when everyone had to strip down to their underwear and both women ended up being in skimpy underwear while the guys were more covered. That said I liked that there were no lingering close-ups and the one we got was of Paul's ass. It didn't feel as exploitative as it could have.
+ I was surprised that more deaths didn't happen because of the creatures though I did like that the environment proved to be as dangerous to the crew as the creatures themselves.
+ I can't believe they actually killed the black guy first. That is not a movie horror trope that should be followed. They should have switched Rodrigo's actor with Smith or Paul's actor.
+ I wonder if we were supposed to think Rodrigo gave Norah the good helmet and kept a defective one for himself? It seemed like it was hinting at that. I actually don't mind it if that's true because as he said at the beginning - she knew how to save them when he had no idea. Him realising that only one of them could survive and making the self-sacrificing play because her skills/knowledge would give the group as a whole a better chance of survival was great. It just should have been more textual. Especially because in the end she was the reason there were survivors and she ends up doing the same thing herself.
+ I was surprised that we didn't get more from Emily, the biologist, about this new unknown species. If you're going to have a biologist character (totally not necessary in the movie) and introduce a new species I feel like you should do something with it.
