Deep Blue Sea (15)

If there's one underlying mantra which links the monster movies of the 20th century, it is that man messes with nature at his peril. From Frankenstein through the giant-creature B-movies of the 1950s to Cronenberg's remake of The Fly, science and nature have long made for explosive bed-fellows.

So while the winsome marine biologist (Saffron Burrows) of Renny Harlin's Deep Blue Sea may be motivated by the best of intentions when she starts extracting protein from a bunch of guinea-pig sharks, the girl is playing God - and that (in the cautionary world of Hollywood at least) is a naughty no-no.

Predictably, then, these sharks subsequently break loose from their cages; and, perhaps even more predictably, turn out to be somehow mutated, made meaner by the scientific meddling. After all, genre outings like Deep Blue Sea are not about innovation or ambiguity. They follow a swift, strict course from point A to point B - with lots of killing in between, naturally.

In this way Harlin reduces his cast to a kind of glorified cannon- fodder; fish-bait with a Hollywood agent. The audience kills time during the film's treading-water sections by speculating as to which character (Burrows or LL Cool J or Thomas Jane or Samuel L Jackson) will get eaten first. We ogle the state-of-the-art special effects while turning a discreet blind eye to the substandard human ones. Meantime Harlin's marine-lab disaster pic (dubbed "Jaws indoors" by American wags) pitches wildly between tongue-in-cheek pastiche and straightforward actioner, loaded all the way by a rash of cheesy dialogue.

Apparently Deep Blue Sea boasted a budget close to $100 million. How much of that went on the script is anyone's guess.

Xan Brooks

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