Sailing the seas of cheese - but in a good way

Rating: 7/10 (2 June 2000)

Although bogged down with overly familiar characters and ideas, this film ultimately entertains the pants off of you by being quite magnificently tense and claustrophobic. The characters don't really elicit a massive amount of sympathy or interest, but you care enough to want to see them make it through. The cliches unfortunately undermine the film in what could have been a great drama / character piece too, but this is a small quibble when you leave the cinema feeling as exhilarated as you do after this film. The action scenes are great and for a change the submarines don't look fake ( always given away by the fact film makers can never make a little water look like a lot, something about the way it moves ) and with the right sound system, you feel like it's you being depth charged. Good stuff, fun and dynamic.