Audience Member
I thoroughly enjoyed this film at a friend's house with some good company and the express intention of watching a very bad movie. And boy did we find it. From the director of Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure comes the sequel nobody wanted from a film that nobody liked. Into the Blue 2: The Reef is bad soap opera dialogue, plot and acting with the egregious tits and arse of a Fast and Furious movie. There's the same underwater shoot padded over six times throughout the entire movie and the glorious use of split screen editing and incongruous and sudden bursts of ear-splitting music from unknown bands so the director could fit a music video's worth of stock underwater footage or bikini volleyball in for several 4 minutes 37 seconds and prevent the entire running time from being 40 minutes and change of actual 'plot'.
Characters don't flinch after the people they love are killed, villains disappear, or instead end up acting with their mouths almost entirely shut, and none of it is engaging or interesting or makes a lick of sense.
But sandwiched in two parts between a viewing of Ultraviolet, this film looked like Citizen Kane by comparison. Bad but not abysmal. Cheap and crass but not offensive or studio-destroyed. All in all, I guess they all made the exact kind of film they wanted to make, which by that, I mean, a film that allowed everyone to go to the beachside for the entire shoot.
Rated 1.5/5 Stars •
Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars
02/17/23
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Audience Member
Kinda like Baywatch but without fan service
Rated 1/5 Stars •
Rated 1 out of 5 stars
02/07/23
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Audience Member
just because I love the water a other then that it's not really worth watching, first one is way better
Rated 1.5/5 Stars •
Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars
01/13/23
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Audience Member
A generic crime thriller, Into the Blue 2: The Reef is a poorly made piece of garbage. The story follows a scuba diving team that's hired by a smuggler to recover some lost cases, but they soon discover that things are not what they appear to be. Laura Vandervoort, David Anders, and Marsha Thomason lead the cast, but their performances are rather weak. And the writing is incredibly bad; full of one-dimensional characters and standard genre tropes. Additionally, the directing is unfocused and doesn't bring any intensity or suspense to the film. Formulaic and clichéd, Into the Blue 2: The Reef is uninspired tripe.
Rated 1.5/5 Stars •
Rated 1.5 out of 5 stars
02/08/23
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Audience Member
Plot holes. Flaws. Unconvincing bad guys. But that aside, it was alright. Made me miss the original so much more as it was far better than this.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
02/02/23
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Audience Member
This movie just starts off as more of the same, beautiful people doing fun things but this movie actually does what I asked by tightening up the pace and the story kicked in a little earlier with more development of what's going on and what we get is a pretty good movie because of it.
It might have the name Into the Blue 2 but it's a sequel in name only, none of the original cast return, but they go into the blue! So I guess it makes sense. The movie starts off with the end screen from the first so if you really wanted to you could super cut these together to have two separate tales that have the same sort of themes. The movie still looks beautiful and the under water segments are great, the music was great as well and really fit with the movie, just like the first. The movie also has a lot of comedy and it works when it's needed.
However unlike the first, the story actually started quite early on and before that the characters actually get development and continue to do so throughout the movie. There are some moments between the diving where characters just sit down and talk about the problems they're going through and I appreciated that. There's a scene that explains why one of the characters doesn't like to have a gun on the boat and while at first it is seemingly random and looks like it is going to be brought up later, it's just a moment of character development, which I really liked. These characters are good and likeable and that always helps.
The other pair in the movie are actually likeable and nice and when it's revealed (by them) that they have been lying to the lead characters, they apologise for it and try to make it up to them with more cash for endangering them. The movie even has a rival in it and he isn't annoying, he's actually funny, he has some good comedic scenes that are funny and when push comes to shove he puts the rivalry aside and actually helps when he's needed.
The problems start to arise when the lead characters go meddling in places where they shouldn't, it makes sense for the story and it does create tension that lasts throughout but it's just one of those moments where you go, 'oh don't do that! What are you doing?'. The girl in the relationship, like Alba's character in the first, is the one to suspect something is wrong, and while she's right, it's just a scenario of ignorance is bliss. I could never really hate the other couple in the movie, probably because of the accents, but before this point they weren't cliché villains holding them at gun point forcing them to work for them, they were honest, kind and offered them money, which is a big change for scenarios like this one.
But after the 50 minute mark it just kinda becomes what I just mentioned and it certainly isn't bad, it fits the story well and the action is good. The pace of this movie is great, the 90 minutes really did fly by and I liked this movie a lot, the story kicked in really quickly and a lot happened in it with likeable characters that have development.
Two for two for the pointless nightclub scene, while it exists to give the lead female in the movie a reason to suspect the other couple, it just felt like the other movie, it could have been taken out and while it has another comedic scene for the rival it doesn't need to be there. There's also a bit where the rival zones out so whatever his girlfriend is saying just speeds up and it was funny but really silly. And the 'I'm not a murderer line' was weird, for a heroic line moment, it could have been better and instead of 6 weeks at the end, it's 6 months, woo.
For a sequel, even if its just in name only, that no one really had to put any effort into, it's nice to see that someone did. With an improved pace and story, this standalone sequel is actually pretty fun. You could say that it should have another name but if it did a lot people might not have checked it out! It might not have anything to do with the first but they certainly go into the blue and I've made that joke already. Check it out, it isn't half bad.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
02/25/23
Full Review
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