Review: Below

How about a little small-town terror? Or perhaps sea terror is a more accurate term. Below is here and, unsurprisingly, it is currently sitting at number one on Netflix. I first heard about it a few weeks ago when Alexander Karim, a favorite among Swedish actors, posted the trailer with the text “blink and you’ll miss it” or something like that, because that’s exactly how it was—he flashes by in the trailer for about a second. A bit more in the series itself. I do like this type of film and series. A bit of mystery, some family coziness, the vulnerability of a small coastal town far from civilization—and some monsters on top of that. Not to be confused with David Twohy’s submarine film Below from 2002. What they have in common is just that—water. And genre traits. I was also curious because Josh Hartnett plays the lead role. I’ve always liked him and right now, at the time of writing, I feel like rewatching 30 Days of Night. An underrated, but perhaps slightly overlong, horror gem—a hot tip for those who, like me, aren’t usually huge fans of vampire movies. But let’s stick to the subject—we’re here to talk about Below. What is it exactly?

Calvin Penney is a kind-hearted but stubborn fisherman living in a small town in Newfoundland. He is still haunted by his father’s mysterious death decades ago. When an unidentified sea creature begins terrorizing his hometown, Calvin must fight to keep the close-knit community together. Determined to protect his son Wade and the rest of his family, he teams up with a visiting marine researcher to face the creature and uncover the island’s buried secrets before it’s too late. Below is a six-part miniseries with episodes around forty minutes each.

Hartnett plays, as you might have gathered, Calvin Penney. In other roles, we see Mackenzie Davis (Speak No Evil), Charlie Heaton (Stranger Things), Rohan Campbell (Halloween Ends), Natasha Henstridge (Species), David Wenham (Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers), and the previously mentioned Alexander Karim (Gladiator II). A lot of famous names and many recognizable faces, in other words. The series is created and partially written by Jesse McKeown, a Canadian screenwriter and producer who has been involved in The Umbrella Academy, a superhero series I never quite got into.

Let’s start with the positives: Below builds atmosphere quite well. The first two episodes manage to balance a bit of unease with vulnerability and some family sweetness. It never quite catches fire, but it’s still interesting enough to keep me engaged. I like how life in the Newfoundland town of Snooks Arm is portrayed, with the division among the population resulting from the government’s offer to pay a decent amount of money to relocate them, as it’s costly to keep a small, isolated community running and job opportunities are apparently scarce. Calvin, for example, drives around collecting ice to sell to the local vodka producer. Ice, of all things. But then strange things start to happen. And now we come to the section I call STDW. Shit That Doesn’t Work. Or wait. I should mention that Below is quite good-looking, thanks to beautiful scenery. That is, if we overlook the fact that the CGI effects leave something to be desired.

So. Back to STDW. Because there is a lot that doesn’t work here. I had been looking forward to Below and was, as previously mentioned, not converted but still reasonably satisfied after two episodes. There was something there. It did some things right, and I thought that now, from episode three onwards, they’re really going to floor it and it’ll be suspense and terror all the way. Well. The pace might pick up a bit, but so do the problems. The script falters significantly. The direction as well. I can’t decide if the Newfoundland accent works or not. Sometimes it’s charming, but often it feels exaggerated; some actors almost make it sound like they’re doing a South Park bit and mocking Canadians. It’s mainly about the British Charlie Heaton, whose character might be a bit of a yokel, but at times almost feels like the little brother of one of the southerners in Deliverance (and now you’re hearing banjo strumming in the back of your head, admit it). That leads me to the acting, which is a bit hit-or-miss. Often it feels like the actors don’t quite know how their characters are expected to react in certain situations. It becomes stiff and a bit odd. One of the clearest examples comes toward the end when Heaton’s character is supposed to hand a ring to his sister (no, I’m not talking about incest, this isn’t Game of Thrones) and something in the reactions from both makes me want to pause and sew a cringe pillow. The same actually applies to Hartnett, who also looks a bit lost in some situations. The funniest example is actually provided by Mackenzie Davis right at the end of the series. I won’t reveal what is said, as it might be a bit of a spoiler, but she delivers dialogue that I think is meant to sound a bit sad, with dark undertones, but she smiles and makes it sound like “Shit happens, and look, I found a bag of Gott och blandat, so why sulk?”

I mentioned that the script falters significantly. This applies to both certain parts of the dialogue and the dramaturgy. Not to mention logic gaps that are at times as large as that iceberg that floated into the bay. For instance, the fact that Calvin, who has seen what the underwater creature is capable of—right, you’re thinking, this was supposed to be a monster series, but you’ve barely mentioned it. He has seen it drag a moose into the water. He has seen it tear down a boat. He has seen it sink a house on a barge. And yet he lets himself be talked into—very easily, it should be added—getting into a tiny damn boat with an outboard motor. There are many moments during these six episodes where I sit and wonder what the screenwriters were thinking, because so much of it feels utterly stupid. Another example is when he is on the ship where we meet Alexander Karim’s character; someone steals the motorboat Calvin took out there—and it turns out to be the ship’s captain and first mate, and I almost have to restrain myself from screaming “Really?” at the TV at the risk of waking my son sleeping in the next room. It’s as if they actually had a decent idea that they expanded into a semi-functional skeleton, but when it came time to build muscle and vital organs, they were in a huge hurry. Or suffered a total brain freeze.

And the monster, right. We realize quite early what kind of monster it is. It’s not on screen very much. In fact, it feels a bit like it’s making a cameo. No, not quite like that, but they start building up a mystery and a slight unease around it that is then completely lost. Below actually becomes neither unsettling nor particularly exciting in the end. There’s a twist, of course, or two or three. One of them is quite clever, but it doesn’t help much. Toward the end, when the town is to be evacuated—I won’t reveal why—it also becomes almost unintentionally comical. And the family comes up with a plan to move the iceberg out of the harbor—again, I won’t reveal why—and the plan is, well—it’s so stupid. Here too. The most interesting thing about the series is almost how small-town life is portrayed. And then we have the two guys from the mainland who went there to threaten Calvin’s son Jay, who owes them money. Here, too, there are scenes that are strange and at times unintentionally comical. As you can tell, I don’t think this is particularly good. And it’s a shame. Because there is, again, something interesting at its core, if you like this type of film and series.

Have you seen the Norwegian monster movie Kraken? The one that was hyped quite a bit and apparently cost our oil-rich neighbors a lot of money. No? Congratulations. Don’t—and feel free to thank me for that. Watch the disaster movie Vågen if you missed it and want to see something Norwegian. The reason I mention Kraken is because it has a lot in common with Below. A similar feel, roughly as beautiful views—and it rushes through a similar minefield, managing to trip up in almost exactly the same places: lack of tension. Far too few monsters to be called a monster movie. A poor, extremely poorly conceived end product. Spend your time on something else instead. Mike Flanagan’s new Carrie-series, perhaps?