47 Meters Down
Blu-ray | DVD | Digital
Directed by Johannes Roberts
Written by Johannes Roberts, Ernest Riera
Starring Mandy Moore, Claire Holt, Matthew Modine, Chris Johnson, Yani Gellman, Santiago Segura
Lionsgate
PG-13 | 89 minutes
Release date: September 26, 2017

47 Meters Down is a shark movie starring Mandy Moore (This is Us) and Claire Holt (The Originals) as sisters on vacation in Mexico, who decide to go cage diving with Great Whites. That turns out to be a bad decision as their cage plummets to the titular depth, and soon the women are fighting for survival from both the sharks above and the impending loss of oxygen. I’ll be honest, this movie had me at “shark.” I am an unabashed shark movie enthusiast. Spielberg’s JAWS is one of my favorite films ever, and I started writing for Geeks of Doom by covering the Sharknado franchise. So suffice to say, if you put sharks in a movie, I’ll be there to watch it. Unfortunately, sharks are about the only thing 47 Meters Down has going for it.

47 Meters Down
Director: Johannes Roberts
Screenwriter: Johannes Roberts, Ernest Riera
Cast: Mandy Moore, Claire Holt, Matthew Modine, Chris J. Johnson, Yani Gellman, Santiago Segura
Distributor: Entertainment Studios
Rated PG-13 | 85 Minutes
Release Date: June 16, 2017

The late Chicago Sun-Times film critic Roger Ebert once said, “No good movie is too long, just as no bad movie is short enough.” By that measure, 47 Meters Down was the longest 85 minutes of my life. It’s precious time that I’ll never get back. It’s time I would have gladly spent stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic or at the dentist’s office getting holes drilled into every tooth in my head.

Co-written and directed by Johannes Roberts (Storage 24, The Other Side of the Door), 47 Meters Down is a horror-thriller starring Mandy Moore (This Is Us) and Claire Holt (The Vampire Diaries) as sisters who go looking for adventure and find it in a shark-diving excursion that goes horribly wrong.

The Originals The Complete First Season
Blu-ray | DVD | Instant
Created by Julie Plec
Starring Joseph Morgan, Daniel Gillies, Claire Holt, Phoebe Tonkin, Charles Michael Davis, Daniella Pineda, Leah Pipes, and Danielle Campbell
The CW/ Warner Bros.
Release Date: September 2, 2014

The naughty, passionate, super fun, vicious, yet capable-of-great-love Mikaelsons, the “original” vampire clan, jumped into their own spin-off from The Vampire Diaries, with Klaus (Joseph Morgan) leading the charge. Licking his wounds after being rejected by Caroline (Candice Accola), Klaus returns to New Orleans, the city he and his siblings helped build, and reunites with his vampire “son” Marcel (Charles Michael Davis). Marcel is now king of New Orleans and Klaus wants it back. Klaus also has a new prince or princess on the way. His indiscretion with Hayley (Phoebe Tonkin) on TVD resulted in a little hybrid bump! Alliances between vampires, witches, wolves, and hybrids are formed, broken, and reformed, as the struggle for the city continues throughout the season.

The Originals is still finding its footing in its inaugural season, but it has enough rich backstory from The Vampire Diaries and the included featurettes, and enough charisma in Joseph Morgan’s pinky alone, to keep us interested. Apparently it kept the network interested too since it was renewed for a second season.