Blu-ray Review: ‘Dark Tide’ Finds Halle Berry Shipwrecked in Sea of Clichés

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CHICAGO – Poor Halle Berry. Apparently ravishing good looks, fine acting chops and an Academy Award for Best Actress aren’t enough to earn decent roles in Hollywood. Since her triumphant turn in 2001’s “Monster’s Ball,” Berry has had only two big screen roles that managed to hint at her gifts as an actress. Yet “Things We Lost in the Fire” and “Frankie & Alice” were largely ignored by critics and audiences.

Sadly, Berry’s name has gradually become synonymous with cinematic turkeys like 2004’s “Catwoman,” for which she graciously accepted a Razzie award while delivering a hilariously self-deprecating speech. That was a terrible film, to be sure, but it wasn’t nearly as depressing as John Stockwell’s PG-13-rated would-be blockbuster, “Dark Tide. It was deservedly released on Blu-ray less than a month after its alleged and seemingly nonexistent theatrical run. Even Berry’s most devoted fans will want to avoid this soggy mess at all costs.

HollywoodChicago.com Blu-ray Rating: 1.0/5.0
Blu-ray Rating: 1.0/5.0

With titles like “Blue Crush” and “Into the Blue” under his belt, Stockwell would appear to be a filmmaker as curiously obsessed with water as James Cameron, thus making the Cameron in-joke in “Dark Tide” utterly inevitable. Yet the Cameron production that “Tide” most closely resembles is the woefully misguided 3D dud, “Sanctum,” which followed hackneyed melodrama archetypes on their dreary slog toward a watery grave. “Tide” has the same sort of premise, though the details of its plot are even more maddeningly insipid. Berry stars as a shark expert emotionally scarred by a bloody attack that resulted in the death of a friend. It’s obvious that the excessive laughter in the film’s opening sequence exists solely to be played back in sad, wistful montages. Yet Berry’s performance is more whiny than it is psychologically tortured, thus providing the audience with no indication of her supposed trauma. When a wealthy British adventurer (Ralph Brown) offers to pay Berry an extravagant sum of money for a day of shark diving, her ex-boyfriend (Olivier Martinez) secretly promises the man that his wish will be granted. Martinez’s desperate attempt to save Berry’s ailing business is passed off as noble, but his actions are indefensibly loathsome. Since it took Berry’s character a full decade to perfect the dangerous art of shark diving, there is absolutely no reason why she should take Brown’s offer. It’s impossible to care about people overpowered by their own idiocy.

Dark Tide was released on Blu-ray and DVD on April 24, 2012.
Dark Tide was released on Blu-ray and DVD on April 24, 2012.
Photo credit: Lionsgate Entertainment

Since the film runs an unwatchable 114 minutes, it takes nearly an hour and a half for the film to arrive at its expected climax in shark infested waters. Brown is such a tiresome jerk that he instantly becomes the first person audiences would like to see get fed to a great white, but Stockwell has the audience wait far too long for a pay-off. He also precedes the deaths with a series of laughably improbable apologies designed to make the audience feel bad when otherwise detestable characters finally croak. There’s also a comic relief (Mark Elderkin) who literally walks into scenes and asks, “Wanna hear a joke?” Yet none of Elderkin’s gags inspire the same level of guffaw earned by Berry’s valley-girl delivery of the line, “We’re sinking!” Her voice sounds so hopelessly detached that she might as well be saying, “We’re stinking!”

The sole highlights of “Tide” are a few early shots lensed by Jean-François Hensgens (“District 13: Ultimatum”) that follow characters as they plunge through the surface of the water. There’s a tangible reality to these images that’s conspicuously lacking in the rest of the underwater sequences, which mainly juxtapose close-ups of actors with documentary footage of sharks. When an actor shares the frame with a toothy predator, the shark often resembles a digital cartoon. It’s difficult to adequately dissect the quality of the effects since they are almost entirely obscured during the barely visible climax. “Open Water” mastered the art of minimalist imagery in order to create a terrifying atmosphere of claustrophobic doom. Stockwell should consider studying that picture before he even thinks of stepping foot in the water again.

“Dark Tide” is presented in 1080p High Definition (with a 2.35:1 aspect ratio), accompanied by English and Spanish subtitles, and includes no extras. The main menu is preceded by over fifteen minutes of promos, including one for “Monster’s Ball,” which still stands an an enduring reminder of the career Berry could’ve had if studios hadn’t viewed her purely as disposable eye candy.

‘Dark Tide’ is released by Lionsgate Entertainment and stars Halle Berry, Olivier Martinez, Ralph Brown, Mark Elderkin and Luke Tyler. It was written by Ronnie Christensen and Amy Sorlie and directed by John Stockwell. It was released on April 24, 2012. It is rated PG-13.

HollywoodChicago.com staff writer Matt Fagerholm

By MATT FAGERHOLM
Staff Writer
HollywoodChicago.com
matt@hollywoodchicago.com

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