MOVIE REVIEW: The Gorge
Images courtesy Apple Films
THE GORGE– 3 STARS
Call Anya Taylor-Joy and Miles Teller, the two stars of The Gorge, what you will. Matinee idols. Mary Sue and Gary Sue. The beautiful people. As soon as you meet their top-tier ex-military assassin characters in Scott Derrickson’s sci-fi thriller, you know they’re going to dominate, win the day, and most likely woo each other in the process. The obviousness, for many, shrinks part of the enjoyment as being too easy.
LESSON #1: ACCEPTING MARY AND GARY SUES– However, this same dominance happens all the time in adventure movies like The Gorge, and no one bats an eye or pushes that comfort food entertainment away. Still, there’s a sliding scale of sorts. When do we want the Mary Sues and Gary Sues to kick ass, and when do we prefer more of an underdog struggle? When is it all right to root for the easy win in a movie, and when are we being unchallenged or being too easy to please?
Deeper though, what compels us for certain heroic movies beyond these dreamboats with best-of-the-best skill sets? First, it depends on the stars chosen. Radiant charisma and a touch of romance sure help when it comes to letting the beautiful people win. An interesting opponent, or predicament would help even more. Luckily, The Gorge offers enough of those enhancers to give us a good time with marquee names.
Written as a spec script by The Tomorrow War’s Zack Dean and plucked off the 2020 Black List by Skydance Media for Apple Films, The Gorge has a very intriguing Lost-esque premise of an ominous and ambiguous threat to all mankind hidden from the world’s view. Somewhere in a remote, northern, and unidentified coniferous mountainscape lies the foggy titular crevasse. Since the end of World War II, it has been guarded by a pair of fortified towers manned by a single operative paid handsomely for a year-long shift disconnected from all ties to the outside world. They are tasked with maintaining the sizable arsenal of heavy firepower and cloaking devices encircling the expanse.
The latest two people hired for this secret duty are Dasha and Levi (Taylor-Joy and Teller), both of which are drifting between jobs and reasons for doing the work. She is an active Lithuanian sniper humanized by her support for her cancer-stricken father Erikas (William Houston of The Last Duel). He is a former Marine disillusioned by contract killing and pulled out of self-imposed retirement scribbling poetry by the gorge offer from the mysterious government spook Bartholomew (the iconic Sigourney Weaver in intimidating boss mode). When Levi arrives at his tower, we learn the foreshadowing exposition-dump skinny from the departing J.D. (TV star Sope Dirisu of Slow Horses and Gangs of London).
As J.D. tells it like it is, the caretaker guardians are ordered to not ask questions, not contact the other tower, and, most importantly, not let anything—and they mean anything—OUT of the gorge. According to J.D., this is the “door to hell and we’re standing on guard at the gate.” Cue the raised eyebrow and the spine-tingling score from Oscar winners Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross!
LESSON #2: REVEALING OR NOT REVEALING THE MONSTER– Now, the best unwritten rule when it comes to creature features like The Gorge is to hide the proverbial “monster” for as long as you can. The historical shining examples of that guideline for maximum anticipation will always be Jaws and Alien. It’s a crucial choice to be made for every screenplay and director. The Gorge springs its reveal relatively early, which opens the drama and the entire movie up to that aforementioned judgement of whether or not the chosen horror is a worthy opponent for our hot couple.
With the drop of the “couple” label and the bare minimum cast of an isolated survival flick, The Gorge puts substantial time into creating a connection between Miles Teller and Anya Taylor-Joy. Starting with flirting via binoculars and rifle scopes, the two exhibit the uncanny ability to know precisely when they’re being watched by the other across long distances, leading to longing stars and written notes. In almost record time and with little to no apprehension for safety or their overseer’s rules, The Gorge is quick to turn these stone-cold killers into lovelorn puppies in rapid time, complete with the girl from The Queen’s Gambit getting a chess montage and the Whiplash boy getting a drumming scene.
LESSON #3: SOFTENING GENRES– In many ways, The Gorge becomes a movie of tenuously-blurred lines. The film’s PG-13 rating grants wide appeal, but squelches some of the steamy potential and the vicious gore available for Guillermo del Toro’s and Chad Stehelski’s go-to cinematographer Dan Lausten that would raise thermometers and hairs on the back of one’s neck. Even though Reznor and Ross’s score creates a formidable mood, there’s still a too obvious cover of “All Along the Watchtower” winking at the camera. Circling back to Lesson #2 and with that softer rating in mind, once the unexplained evil at the bottom of The Gorge is revealed, the intriguing impact of the who and the what is iffy, fueled by the unique visual effects designs from supervisor Erik Nordby (Pokemon: Detective Pikachu).
This softy route may have diehard action fans asking if The Gorge can hide the romance instead of the monster. The Gorge actively traded hardass edge for sexy romantic attraction, thanks to the engaging headliners. Thankfully, Anya Taylor-Joy and Miles Teller look just as good sharing lusty gazes as they do with a deadly rifle on their shoulder while being put through their paces (alongside their doubles) by stunt coordinator Brycen Counts (The Old Guard) and fight coordinator Shahaub Roudbari (Transformers: Rise of the Beasts). What resulted in a lush and entertaining ride undoubtedly left some luster, peril, and, above all, risk at the bottom of its green-screen canyon.
LOGO DESIGNED BY MEENTS ILLUSTRATED (#1282)
