THE REQUIN aka FROM BELOW (2022) Reviews of shark survival drama

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‘In the open water no one can hear you scream’
The Requin is a 2022 American shark survival film about a romantic couple trapped at sea on a flimsy makeshift raft surrounded by sharks. Also known as From Below

Written and directed by Le-Van Kiet (The Ancestral; FurieThe Rich Woman; The Lost Tour: Vietnam; Bay Cap 3; House in the Alley; Dust of Life). Produced by Cameron Burns, Jordan Dykstra, Aaron B. Koontz, Todd Lundbohm, Ashleigh Snead and Ellen S. Wander.

The Film Bridge International-Paper Street Pictures co-production stars Alicia Silverstone (Batgirl; The Lodge; The Killing of a Sacred Deer; Vamps; Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed; Clueless; Batman & Robin), James Tupper, Kameron Hood, Deirdre O’Connell, Jennifer Mudge and Danny Chung.

Plot:
There’s terror in paradise when Jaelyn (Alicia Silverstone) and Kyle (James Tupper) arrive at a remote seaside villa in Vietnam for a romantic getaway. A torrential storm descends, reducing the villa to little more than a raft and sweeping the young couple out to sea.

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Suddenly, another danger appears – a school of Great White sharks. With her injured husband watching helplessly, Jaelyn must battle the deadly predators alone…

Review:
” …her acting style in this movie is generally of the quality that you would expect from former starlet Alicia Silverstone, except for when the big emotional beats are pulled out, at which point things get awkward […] The sharks are not good. They are bad. They are sub-Sharknado bad.” 3/10 AV Forums

“When the film strives to convey something that’s meant to be serious, it, unfortunately, falls victim to the melodramatic writing – conveying more silliness than heartfelt sincerity. With a rough script, wonky CGI, and lackluster performances, The Requin has little to offer in terms of thrilling aquatic horror.” 1/5 Bloody Disgusting

” …much the same as last year’s Great White has a great premise but it is just poorly executed. The number of times Silverstone’s character blacks out beggars belief […] The finale does attempt to salvage the story, introducing some gore, but again the CGI backgrounds stand out like a sore thumb alongside the CGI shark…” Bloody Flicks

” …this movie’s whole hook is “Alicia Silverstone fights a shark” and only now, one hour into an 86-minute (without end credits) runtime, does that first fight take place. You see that mammoth monster that looks like Jaws on The Requin’s poster art? Yeah, that ain’t this. The shark Silverstone swats at is smaller than her, and she beats it back with a jagged piece of wood like an overreacting housewife shooing away a coyote that got into her trashcan.” Culture Crypt

“The first shark movie that could work as a micro theater. A shark movie where the protagonist stands and the coral is more dangerous than the sharks […] The Vietnamese filmmaker, also a screenwriter, has the courage to add increasingly impossible situations until the viewer forgets that this is a movie about f*cking sharks.” Kiko Vega [translated from Spanish]

” …much like Great White, which had a similar overly serious “dramatic” tone to its schlocky story, The Requin looks entirely like it was filmed on a sound stage in a giant tank of water […] It’s hard to sympathise with what happened to our protagonists or empathise with them in their current predicament when everything looks so fake.” Nerdly

“Shot with a few green-screens in Universal Studios Orlando, The Requin looks like it was recorded live during a particularly harrowing Zoom meeting. Some bad image-compositing makes the movie look cheap and some lame dialogue doesn’t help matters much, especially whenever tensions flair, which is often. But Silverstone’s unguarded and credibly freaked-out performance makes it easy to follow…” RogerEbert.com

“Aside from a few stock footage inserts of Hanoi streets and underwater wonderlands, his drama is staged in the tank space and against the green screens of Universal Studios in Orlando. The ‘uncanny valley’ downside of CGI used to create that with which we are familiar takes a chunk out of key moments of suspense – the shark footage waivers from fleetingly convincing to… less so…” Screen-Space

“Usually, it’s the name performer that’s only in the film for five minutes. Alicia Silverstone is in almost every scene in the film, but the shark is the one making a cameo. But then considering how poorly rendered the CGI beast is, that may be a plus after all […] Cap it all off with an incredible non-ending and The Requin is another disappointment…” Voices from the Balcony

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YouTube reviews:

Trailer:

 

Filming locations:
Universal Studios, Orlando, Florida

Technical details:
89 minutes

Budget:
$8,500,000 (estimated)

Fun facts:
Requin is a French word referring to a white shark (Carcharodon carcharias). Requin is accepted by games such as Scrabble and Words with Friends.

Release date:
In the USA, The Requin was released theatrically, On-Demand and on Digital by Saban Films on January 28th 2022. Lionsgate will release the film on Blu-ray and DVD on March 29th 2022.

In the UK, the film was released by Altitude Film Distribution on Digital on 7th February 2022 and on DVD on 21st February 2022.

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