Review: Black Water: Abyss

Set in Northern Australia, five friends go for a weekend of cave exploring. There’s two couples (Jess McNamee and Luke Mitchell, Amali Golden and Benjamin Hoetjes) and their single mate (Anthony J. Sharpe). With a freak storm outside, the cave becomes flooded. Worse, there also lurks a crocodile. Meanwhile, tensions arise among the tight group, with new revelations revealed as they fight to stay alive.

 

Director Andrew Traucki’s “Black Water” from 2007 was one of the best creature feature flicks of the modern era in my view. Low-budget and with a small cast (three people, a croc, murky water, and a tree), it was tense as hell and utterly convincing. I was on edge for every second of its length. Traucki  returned with this 2020 genre film that pits a different set of characters in fairly similar circumstances. Amazingly the quality of the follow-up isn’t that noticeably lesser than the first film, to be honest which is a rarity. I didn’t like Traucki’s shark movie “The Reef” much, but in these two crocodile films he shows he really knows his way around this stuff. I just hope he can show it in subsequent films that don’t have “Black Water” in the title. I liked this film, but I’m not really fussed about seeing a third go-round.

 

The film starts a bit more schlock horror than the first film, but it’s effective, including the use of the irritating, all-encompassing sound of Australian summer: Cicadas. The visuals and soundscape are especially good, that is before we go down in the caves where darkness and tight spaces add to the danger and tension of an animal attack scenario. The horrendous weather happening outside the cave helps in creating a sense of impending doom. The main plot is basically “Black Water” crossed with “The Descent”, and it makes for some very dark, scary scenes throughout. The director is clever enough to use the ‘jump’ scares judiciously, knowing that the darkness and basic situation are tense and scary enough to do most of the work anyway. So unlike “A Quiet Place” it’s not just about the ‘jump’ scares. It’s simple but very effective filmmaking, with the director once again showing he knows how to shoot that muddy, dark water without it getting too murky to see anything. Like the first film we also only get glimpses of the croc (last time it was expertly inserted footage of a real croc from a local zoo), which I think is smart on several levels. I do wish we’d get middle-aged characters for a change in a horror film, and we get your typical early 30s characters here. I think spelunking is an insane pursuit, but for the most part the characters are a relatable and relatively personable lot, which is important I think. None of the actors are Paul Newman or Bette Davis (to choose two great actors off the top of my head), but TV veterans Jess McNamee and former soap actor Luke Mitchell certainly have no problems convincing, McNamee is especially good here. Former “Australian Idol” also-ran Amali Golden (formerly Ward) is probably a better actress than singer. Low bar perhaps, but true nonetheless I think. They all do the most important thing quite well: Look convincingly terrified.

 

There’s not really any flaws here, it’s a B-movie that does what it sets out to and does it well, if not terribly original. The order of death is perhaps a bit surprising, and the finale is quite different from the first film too. It’s probably slightly less effective than the first film, but that’s still a lot better than most sequels. A good Aussie genre film that gets in, keeps you gripped throughout, and gets out in due time. More like this, please. The screenplay is by Ian John Ridley (TV’s “Stingers” and “Wentworth”) & Sarah Smith (also an Aussie TV scribe, including “Rescue Special Ops”).

 

Rating: B-