Wonderful character development!

Highly Overrated But Still Good

Blistering performances.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

There's a great amount of tension in this, which is mainly attributable to the inventive direction, interesting cinematography, and great editing. The writing is where the film falters for me. Kidman is great in this, but the character she plays seems pretty stupid. It takes over an hour for her to even consider using a weapon on this stranger, which she knew she had since the beginning of the film. She is given numerous chances to sneak up behind Hughie, injure him, and throw him overboard - which would be justifiable in this scenario. However, she never does anything close. At the very end she knocks him out and throws him on a blow up raft. It makes me a bit angry that she didn't do that sooner, as she had ample opportunity to. We never actually learn Hughie's motivation for going crazy or reason all the people in his ship died, (or why he possibly killed them). His character was severely underdeveloped. Additionally, his death was really cartoonish and didn't really fit.Since I'm an animal lover, anytime I watch a film with a dog in it, I always check to see if it dies on doesthedogdie.com so I can be prepared. So I knew from the beginning that the dog would die, and I was anticipating it for a while. Once it happened, I found it to be the most fake thing I've seen in a film in recent memory that I actually started laughing.Overall, the tension and acting worked really well in this, but there were too many distracting plot holes to be enjoyable.

After their son is killed in a horrific car accident, Ray and John Ingram (Nichole Kidman & Sam Neill) decide to take a yacht cruise to the middle of open ocean, in order to put their minds off the whole ordeal. They come upon a sinking schooner and rescue a man, Hughie Wariner (played fantastically by Billy Zane) whom is frantically rowing away from it in a dinghy. Hughie insists that the rest of the crew from the schooner have all died from food poisoning. John is not convinced however, as Hughie seems somewhat odd. After putting him to bed, he decides to investigate the schooner for himself. Leaving Ray alone with Hughie, he rows over to the schooner in the dinghy, and once there, he discovers that the entire crew has been brutally murdered. Before he can go back to warn Ray, she is taken captive by Hughie, whom takes control of their boat and drives it away.This is a film I'm sure Alfred Hitchcock would have been proud of. It doesn't rely on bucket loads of blood and gore to scare you, instead it relies on suspense and atmosphere. There is an incredible sense of isolation out in the middle of open water, because there is no one there to help you, which is one factor that makes this film so effective. Billy Zane does an extremely good job at playing a mentally ill individual, the kind of man you would not want to be stuck on a boat with. You can tell from the get go that he is not right in the head; a result of a brilliant performance. Sam Neill also does a good job and plays a likable hero who you root for. Nichole Kidman is the worst of the three but she does okay for the part she's given. At times, her acting can come off as wooden but this didn't ruin the movie for me. Graeme Revell's musical score is extremely memorable and worth noting. The film wouldn't be nearly as effective without it.If you have a taste for psychological thrillers without extreme blood and gore, I strongly recommend you give this film a watch.

After reading the plot for Dead Calm I was expecting an edge-of-your-seat boat massacre thriller, and in a sense that's exactly what Dead Calm is. I was always on the edge of my seat, anxious to know what would happen next and terrified for the characters in their respective situations, but there was much less violence than I was expecting. And I'm not complaining. Most of the violence is implied rather than shown, and the movie not only deals with physical abuse but emotional and mental abuse as well. The story is basically that this couple goes out to sea on a getaway to forget about a recent tragedy, and while they're out in the middle of the ocean they encounter a strange boat and a strange man who claims that his crew was killed by food poisoning. The way the pieces come together is very satisfying, especially when the truth slowly reveals itself and both the husband and wife are going through equally scary dilemmas as this stranger is roaming freely around their boat.The acting is really what sells this movie. A boat movie with only three characters can get boring quickly, but thanks to the cast, I was totally in it. Sam Neil is separated from the others for a good amount of the film, but when he needs to shine, he does. The anchors of this movie are Nicole Kidman and Billy Zane. Kidman is excellent as the emotionally distraught wife who is doing everything she can to keep it together while desperately trying outsmart the stranger. Billy Zane had me worried for a bit - I could tell he was acting, and at times he was a bit cartoonish, but by the end you come to realize that the character is an absolute nutcase so his erratic acting makes sense. You're not sure if he's just a guy who had a rough week, or a sympathetic victim of circumstance, or a straight up maniacal psychopath. This uncertainty helps keep the thriller afloat (yeah) and keeps you anxious to see whatever happens next.The only real complaint I have about Dead Calm is that it does get a little slow at times. It's very atmospheric and moody for a majority of the film and there's no problem with that, but I couldn't help but be distracted during some of the longer quiet moments. Regardless, it all builds up to the movie's exciting climax which doesn't disappoint. The music is great as well - haunting and subtle. Keep in mind Dead Calm is not a jump-scare type of horror thriller. It's slow-paced, grounded and completely plausible, which for me is the scariest kind.

I saw "Dead Calm" on video when it was first released, I remembered I liked it, but the only think I actually remembered was Billy Zane was the bad guy and Nicole Kidman got her bum out during a sex scene (and I liked her pert bum a lot) so when I saw it was starting on TV I decided to revisit it.Plot In A Paragraph: John Ingram (Sam Neil) and his wife Rae (Nicole Kidman) who's recovering from a car accident, are on their sailboat somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. Their tranquil and blissful environment is changed when they rescue Hughie (Billy Zane) the lone survivor of a sinking ship they spot one morning. This is still an entertaining if slightly predictable movie, but I can not help but wonder what happened to the career of Sam Neil (who met his wife, Noriko Watanabe, in the making of this film) as he is a very talented actor with a great every man quality to him. He would go on to great success with "Jurassic Park" and "Event Horizon" both of which I love, before almost disappearing from mainstream movies. Last time I seen him he had a small role in "Escape Plan" opposite Sly Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger. He deserves better. Oh and I still really liked the pert bum of Nicole Kidman.