Dir Jon deBont

Written by Randall McCormick, Jeff Nathanson, Jan de Bont, Graham Yost.

Sandra Bullock, Jason Patric, Willem Dafoe, Temuera Morrison, Christine Firkins, Glenn Plummer, Joe Morton.

A few years have passed since her day on the bus with Jack, and Annie (Bullock) is now in a relationship with Alex (Patric) who she thinks works beach patrol, but he is really just like his predecessor and is an adrenaline junkie cop (with the same boss Morton). When she finds out their relationship hits the skids, so he surprises her with a trip to the Caribbean.

The only problem is Gieger (Dafoe), a former employee of the cruise liner they are on , who was fired for getting sick, and now is taking the boat hostage, and sending it right into an oil tanker – at maximum speed… for a cruise liner… all 16 knotts (or 30kmh or 18mph)

Where to start???

They spent $160 MILLION on this, and I honestly don’t know where the money went. The primary cast, Bullock, Patric and Dafoe work with a terrible script, that for the first half almost feels like a bad romantic film with a little bit of action on the side. The dialogue between Annie and Alex is just laughable at the most parts, and feels totally non organic at all.

Bullock does what she can but she is written at times as the supposed lead, and then at others the damsel in distress. Patric is also lost with a badly conceived film, and is a little wooden himself. It didn’t help the giganitic shoes he had to fill in the screenplay 1990’s Keanu Reeves turned down. The only player giving 110% is Dafoe, who hams it up to the nth degree, and clearly read the assignment. There is also a few returning faces from #1 including Maurice (Plummer), Mack (Morton) and one of the elevator ladies, who ‘has a feeling’ about the events in this one.

Another gripe on the screenplay is that it pushed for the PG-13 in America (still getting a soft M here in a Australia, but probably could have been given a PG) – with no use of the ‘f’ word at all.

There is a new score (for those who have read some of my reviews know how much I enjoy a good score), and this one is not one of them. It is not dynamic, and it doesn’t add anything to the tension that I will give, this film has some moments of. The original score is very briefly underplayed in one scene. The ship crash scene was done fairly decently, and this is possibly what ate up most of the astonishingly large budget.

This was worthy of all the vitriol it received, and why some of the cast hate that it’s on their CV. Saved from a lower score by the incredible performance of Dafoe.

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