Horror at sea - it's a theme that I always crave, as well as creature features, eco horrors and lovecraftian vibes. Luckily, "Sea Fever" happens to be a bit of all that. There's no denying I had high hopes and some certain expectations which resulted in a bonus side dish of underwhelment, well, whether because of that or the actual flawed nature of "Sea Fever", for it might be a bit better in concept than execution.
A quiet, shy but clever science student Siobhan (Hermione Corfield) is put on a fishing boat to do a marine research assignment, and takes a turn in journey to becoming a heroine as the crew encounter a mysterious and threating sea creature. Very quickly into the movie the viewer can rest assured he's in for a good-looking sea adventure, for it is aesthetically well executed via solid cinematography and subtly beautiful production design and cgi. The boat carries 7 passengers, all of which are painted neatly and realistically, albeit typically. As time passes, a wish for more innovative characters inside such a situation surfaces, eventually the fates of some miss the emotional hit it intends to have. Nevertheless, the cast certainly does a good job, my personal favorite being Ardalan Esmaili.
The first act is the one that, near the end of it, delivers some lovecraftian vibes, as the gooey, tentacly creature comes up from the depths of the sea. From here on, "Sea Fever" makes it known it's not exactly a classic creature feature & becomes more of an eco horror, with some key themes coincidentally very relevant to the current time of an pandemic - our main heroine has to fight for the right decisions in an event of infection and a need for quarantine. The underwhelment distills from the fact that "Sea Fever", during the better part of the second and third acts, struggles to maintain tension and frequently loses the effect of its atmosphere, in process making the pacing uneven and punches - lesser. As far as a fever goes, it doesn't quite manage to rise your temperature that high.
"Sea Fever" doesn't hide its influences & John Carpenter would probably be pretty happy, because, despite all, it stands very much on its own, a smart and handsome thriller that couldn't escape the fate of some bugging flaws. My rating: 6/10
