Film Review: Below

About Below (2002)War adventure with an eerie supernatural undercurrent. In World War 2, an American submarine rescues three survivors from a British hospital ship sunk by the Nazis. What should have been a routine rescue mission escalates into claustrophobic terror as the crew begin collectively to experience paranoid delusions – and to believe that their vessel is haunted. When first officer Lieutenant Brice (Bruce Greenwood) is forced to take over command after the unexpected death of the submarine’s commander, he finds he must not only shake off the German destroyer attacking the sub, he must also get to the bottom of the string of mysterious and terrifying incidents that are debilitating his crew.

Starring: Olivia Williams, Zach Galifianakis, Jason Flemyng, Bruce Greenwood, Matthew Davis

Directed by: David Twohy

Runtime: 105 minutes

Studio: Echo Bridge Home Entertainment

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Review: Below 

Wolfgang Petersen’s Das Boot remains one of the tensest films I’ve ever seen so the prospect of a horror film set on a submarine intrigued me. Directed by David Twohy, Below focuses on the USS Tiger Shark which is patrolling the Atlantic in 1943. The submarine receives communication to rescue survivors from a sunken ship that went down days before. The crew find a British nurse and two sailors, one who is badly wounded. Following the trio’s arrival, the crew of the USS Tiger Shark grow increasingly paranoid and fearful that some unseen assailant is amongst them while on the surface a German warship is hunting them and trying to blow them out of the water.

The submarine is headed by Lieutenant Brice (Bruce Greenwood) who is less than keen to have survivors on board especially with one being a woman, Claire (Olivia Williams). Tensions rise on the submarine when the wounded man turns out to be German and is killed by Brice. Claire reveals that her ship was carrying patients and was a British vessel posing no threat to anyone. There is a mystery on board the USS Tiger Shark with Captain Winters (Nick Hobbs) having drowned while trying to retrieve souvenirs from a German warship the submarine had sunk days before. Claire suspects Brice isn’t being completely honest about his version of events and she finds support from Odell (Matt Davis).

Below has some of the tension of Das Boot with the USS Tiger Shark being the hunted as the Germans use sonar to locate them and drop depth charges on them. Every time I see this in films I imagine how terrifying it must have been for those that went through it. The rest of the film has some of the usual creep elements, strange noises inside and outside the submarine, music suddenly playing, a faint voice coming from the corpse of the murdered German and some of the crew believing the late Captain Winters is haunting them. The question is will the crew be picked off by this malevolent threat on board with them.

I thought Below was quite a good little horror/thriller. It kept me interested throughout and I think the blend of a very real threat above the submarine coupled with what might or might not be a genuine threat on board worked well. There may not be any great surprises in the end but there is still some good tension.

Verdict: 3/5

(Film source: reviewer’s own copy)

Film Review: Below | Thank you for reading Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dave