Shark movies have become a trope.

Throw a few sharks in the water, mix in some unsuspecting swimmers, preferably of the teen variety, have lots of screaming, and you’ve got the makings of a horror movie. Trouble is, like the slasher film before it, the shark movies have become carbon copies of each other, and most of the time, they’re not very good.

This is the biggest thing that 47 METERS DOWN: UNCAGED (2019) has working against it. Even though it tries to be different, it’s still a shark movie, which takes away from some of the solid scares it manages to deliver.

47 METERS DOWN: UNCAGED (2019) is also a sequel. The first film, 47 METERS DOWN (2017) was a movie I liked but didn’t love. The good news here is 47 METERS DOWN: UNCAGED has nothing to do with that first movie. It’s got all new characters and an all new story. The only connection between the two are the sharks, and the location. Both movies take place in Mexico.

47 METERS DOWN: UNCAGED is the story of two sisters. The movie opens when one of the sisters Mia (Sophie Nelisse) is pushed into a swimming pool by a group of mean girls at their all girl private high school. When the film starts off, it looks like it’s going to be CARRIE meets JAWS, which incidentally might have been a better movie, but that’s not where this one ultimately goes, as the bullies take a back seat to the two sisters.

Mia’s half-sister Sasha (Corinne Fox) doesn’t get along with her either, and to remedy this, their dad Grant (John Corbett) arranges for them to spend some quality time together on a glass bottom boat shark tour, where they’ll be able to see some great white sharks, which doesn’t really seem like the best parenting idea to me, thrusting two daughters together who really don’t like each other, but of course, this is a shark movie, so you know where this one is going. They’re going to have to put aside their differences once their lives are on the line.

Anyway, they don’t ever go on the tour because Sasha’s friends Alexa (Brianne Tju) and Nicole (Sistine Rose Stallone) show up to whisk them away on a private swimming date. For a moment I thought Sasha was going to ditch Mia, but at least she agrees to take her sister along.

The girls go swimming in a beautiful secluded area, which just so happens to be where Mia and Sasha’s dad has been diving and exploring some ancient underwater caves, as he is busy discovering an underwater city. The girls decide to dive there and explore the underwater city themselves, only for a few minutes.

But things go awry when they discover that inhabiting the underground city are a bunch of s-s-sharks!!! The rest of the film follows the girls as they have to battle the sharks as they try to find their way out of the underwater city.

In spite of this being yet another shark movie and a sequel, there was a lot in 47 METERS DOWN: UNCAGED that I actually liked. The underwater scenes in the submerged city are done very well. Director Johannes Roberts gives this one a claustrophobic feel with lots of attention given to confined spaces and dark narrow tunnels. The camera stays in tight as the characters navigate through the confining underwater caves.  Roberts also directed the first 47 METERS DOWN. I guess he likes shark movies.

Speaking of sharks, the shark scenes here were definitely scary. I thought they were handled better here than in the first movie. The fact that the girls are fighting off the sharks in underwater caves helps, and these just aren’t any sharks. Since they’ve been living in darkness for ages, they’re blind. So, if you’re real quiet, they won’t be able to find you. Hmm. Where have I heard this plot point before? (Hello A QUIET PLACE [2018], as well as DON’T BREATHE [2016]). Trouble is, for some reason, the girls are anything but quiet. They constantly make noise, and as a result, they are constantly under attack.

But that being said, the shark scenes are quite effective and provide the film with lots of tense moments.

Working against the movie is its poor pacing. With its brisk 89 minute running time, I wouldn’t call it a slow-paced movie, but it also has no sense of urgency. It doesn’t use pace to its advantage, as the film never really builds suspense.

It also goes to the well once too often, and its conclusion is nothing short of ludicrous.

The screenplay by Ernest Riera and director Johannes Roberts creates likable characters with the four teenagers and puts them in a dire situation, but it doesn’t do anything above and beyond to make this one stand out. And as I said, the ending is completely unbelievable.

The acting is fine. All four main actors do a serviceable job, Sophie Nelisse as Mia, Corinne Fox as Sasha, Brianne Tju as Alexa, and Sistine Rose Stallone as Nicole. Stallone is Sylvester Stallone’s daughter, and this is her film debut.

The sharks don’t actually look that bad, but they’re not great either. They’re helped by the fact that most of the time they’re seen in the darkness of the underwater caves. Still, I’ve yet to be impressed by a CGI created shark.

Since the bulk of this film takes place in confined spaces, it reminded me somewhat of this year’s earlier release CRAWL (2019) about a daughter and her father terrorized in the flooding basement of their home by hungry alligators during a monstrous hurricane. I liked CRAWL better. For one, it wasn’t about sharks, and it also told a more compelling story and featured stronger acting.

47 METERS DOWN: UNCAGED will barely register on the shark movie meter, but judged on its own merits, it’s really not half bad and does provide a decent amount of shark scares in a dark claustrophobic setting of underwater caves.

You can do a lot worse, so if you like shark movies, you may want to check out 47 METERS DOWN: UNCAGED. Otherwise, don’t take the bait.

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