Open Water: Movie Review~
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Our
Rating
Out Of Four Stars-
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Open Water
Based On
A True Story-
Open
Water might be best described as Blair Witch Project meets
Jaws, only instead of our central characters being lost in the
woods, they're alone in the ocean and instead of the terrorizing
force being a supernatural presence, it's a school of hungry sharks.
Based on a
true story, the premise of Open Water is quite simple,
yet horrifying with a shocking ending. Director Chris Kentis shows
the married couple setting off on a Scuba Diving trip with nine
other couples. Once at the diving spot, the adventurous actors
beautifully played by Susan (Blanchard Ryan) and Daniel (Daniel
Travis) are having the time of their lives as they discover breathtaking
underwater vistas. Overwhelmed by all there is to see, they lose
track of time and are slightly late getting back to the rendevous
point. As they swim to the surface, they are horrified to discover
that the boat is gone. Open Water spends most of
it's running time depicting a terrifying twenty-four hour period
of self preservation under the most intense circumstances.
The
True Story-
The movie
is based on the following true story-
©
Lions Gate Films |
It has been
six and a half years (January 25th, 1998 ) since the two American
tourists (From Baton Rouge, Louisiana) disappeared diving on the
Great Barrier Reef, Australia. If one thing has become clear in
this bizarre case it is that Tom and Eileen Lonergans' story will
never fade and haunts many to this day.
Tom (33) and
Eileen (29) Lonergan had just finished three years in the Peace
Corps in the South Pacific and were on their way to Hawaii to
re-enter college to obtain masters degrees. Diving some 40 miles
offshore, the Lonergans were experienced divers enjoying a three-week
vacation in Austraila before heading off to school. They had met
and married at Louisiana State University, where Eileen had taken
up scuba diving and persuaded Tom to join in her hobby. For two
years they had taught for the Peace Corps in the Pacific island
country of Tuvalu, before spending a further year in Fiji.
During a diving
expedition near St. Crispin reef off Port Douglas, Tom and Eileen
had been the last divers out of the water on the other dives that
day, so it was not hard to assume they may have been a little
tardy on the final dive.
The Lonergans
advised a diving instructor employed on the Outer Edge, Ms. Katherine
Traverso, that they would "go off and do their own thing" (quote
from Mr. Richard Triggs of Cairns, a diver on the trip. This action
by the Lonergans is nothing unusual as most experienced divers
would know, but of which some media made adverse comments soon
after the incident.
When they
did surface after less than an hour underwater, they either saw
the boat (Outer Edge) leaving or saw nothing but open seas.
Outer Edge
Dive Co. did not report the couple missing until two days after
they were left at sea. When the boat had docked, the crew apparently
noticed that there was at least one bag left behind by the passengers
but they do not appear to have investigated this further and simply
moved the bag to another location on the boat. In fact, there
were two bags. One was a plastic bag containing the Lonergans'
dry clothes and Mr Lonergans' glasses. In addition, there was
a nearly empty dive bag and the boat was missing two tanks and
two weight belts!
It was two
days later, when Jack Nairn (Skipper of the boat) claimed to have
found a bag containing the Lonergans' wallet and passports on
the boat, that the alarm was raised. He called the Police, 51
hours after the Lonergans disappeared. On January 28, 1998 a search
by 17 aircraft, helicopters and boats, Police, Navy and civilian
divers began.
A massive
search ensued. Documentation of their fist night was evidenced
by what fishermen 100 miles north of the site found: a dive slate
which records their thoughts as dawn broke that morning. In a
wobbly scrawl faded by months in the water, Tom Lonergan had written:
"Monday Jan 26; 1998 08am. To anyone who can help us: We have
been abandoned on Agin court Reef by MV Outer Edge 25 Jan 98 3pm.
Please help us come to rescue us before we die. Help!!!"
Being experienced
divers, the normal procedure would be to inflate the BCD (Buoyancy
Control Device for diving) and dump the weight belts.
The day after
the incident the Outer Edge brought another tour party to the
area, and one diver found six dive weights resting on the bottom.
Oblivious to what had happened the previous day, a crew member
described the find as a bonus.
When the
boat failed to return, the next course of action would be to discard
the tanks. Exposure to the water and the heat from the sun rapidly
accelerates dehydration.
One of the
few criticisms of the movie was that it was hard to believe that
the boat just left the couple, however it is true and this is
what the official investigation of this incident discovered-
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No proper head
count was performed before the dive vessel left.
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The
Lonergans were not checked back on board by the crew.
~
The
Lonergans' dive details were not recorded in the divemaster's
log book
at the end of the dive.
~
No
dedicated lookout was on duty at the time of the relevant dive.
~
The
boat left at a time when it was reasonable to assume that divers
could
still be under the water.
Former Skipper,
Jack Nairn still lives in the area despite losing his business
as a result of the publicity and debts surrounding his trial.
He initially refused to talk about the case, and would only discuss
how the fallout from the case had affected him. "The reality of
it is that the thing creates emotional turmoil for all of the
people involved," he said.
We
will avoid providing more details on the true story at this point
so as not to ruin the movie for those who wish to see it.
But What
Is Amazing Is That It Happened Again-
After the
Lonergans went missing in Queensland in 1998, you'd think it could
never happen again. But it seems it has. An 80-year-old American
woman went missing after an excursion to the Barrier Reef in 2000.
Police in Port Douglas in far north Queensland once again had
to search the coastline.
Primal
Scream-
The Discovery Channel recently showed a veteran underwater photographer
Valerie De La Valdene in the Galapagos Islands as she re-lived
her most harrowing adventure in 17 years of diving. She came up
to find herself alone in the ocean after having been pulled by
underwater currents far from her fellow divers and the diving
boat.
What was terrifying
was that she had her underwater video camera with her which shows
the entire situation as it unfolds. You can see the first shark
approach her as her video camera is innocently capturing the scene
under the water as she is above it unaware and discovering to
her horror that she is drifting out to sea with nothing in sight.
You can hear the camera capturing her "primal screams"
as she begins to call out for help and as she pushes the first
of many sharks away from her with her fins.
Shown during
their "shark week" the show Primal Scream
shows the mass number of sharks circling her shortly after she
surfaces and she finds she is alone in the water, with no land
in site, no boat and absolute primal fear setting in.
This video
is available on the Discovery Channel via DVD and VHS.
Official
"Open Water" Website
