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'Into the Blue': An all-wet summer movie leftover

By BOB LONGINO
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Here's what you need to know about "Into the Blue": The Bahamas looks like a great place to go scuba diving, and Jessica Alba, tanner than you've ever seen her, mostly wears a skimpy bikini.

You just know young, pretty and sleek movie stars like Alba and Paul Walker have it rough. That's because when they work they have to wear flip-flops, tanks and shorts all the time — except when they happen to be diving, which requires them to wear less underwater. Wearing less is what they do a lot in this movie, which means there's not much in the way of dialogue but a whole lot of time available for moviegoers to ogle limber bodies. Toss in a couple of gratuitous crotch shots and we've got a contender for the No. 1 weekend moneymaker.

MGM/Columbia Pictures

'Into the Blue'

The verdict: Bikini-action fare almost campy enough to be worthy. Except it's not.

Director: John Stockwell
Starring: Paul Walker, Jessica Alba, Scott Caan, Ashley Scott, Josh Brolin
Run time: 110 minutes
Release date: Sept. 30, 2005
Rating: PG-13 for intense sequences of action violence, drug material, some sexual content and language.
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On the web
Official movie site
View the trailer
Trailers require Quicktime

Does "Into the Blue" have a plot?

Well, yes, it does. In the film's first five minutes, the script requires Alba and Walker to make out — twice. Before long, Walker's also uttered the immortal words "gnarly" and "bro."

This being what any Hollywood exec worth his box office would call an "actioner," you know "Blue" will eventually dive off the deep end. And it doesn't disappoint. "Blue" has quality underwater photography but its plot implodes, becoming a mess of hungry sharks, sunken pirate treasure, misplaced cocaine, severed limbs and bubbles. Lots and lots of air bubbles rising from the deep in frantic waves.

It's almost campy enough to be worthy. Except it's not.

Alba and Walker play Sam and Jared, a happy-go-lucky, poor-but-in-so-much-love couple who eke out a living diving in the Caribbean. Their dream is to find pirate treasure.

Enter Scott Caan as Jared's old pal Bryce. A moneyed lawyer, he drops in on our couple from the mainland with his latest girl in tow, Amanda (Ashley Scott). He met her several hours ago in a bar and, apparently, hasn't said "good night" yet.

Wouldn't you know, Bryce has connections. So, suddenly, our handsome and frolicking foursome is swimsuited and hanging out in a swank, seaside mansion that boasts a really cool, and powerful, mini-yacht.

Soon we're bottoms-deep in old pirate treasure, lost drugs, evil cocaine traffickers, merciless overacting, drunken club-dancing, obvious double-crossings, implausible car chases, ridiculous underwater fights, gobbling sharks and those ever-present bubbles.

Caan overplays an atrocious "you-lookin'-at-me?" type scene. Walker gets to show off how long he can hold his breath underwater. And Alba gets to go one-on-one, fighting a ship of foolish bad guys.

The treasure is big. So big, Walker informs his pals ,"If we have found it, we've hit the mother lode of mother lodes."

Clearly, moviegoers have struck something, too. It's the mother lode of all-wet summer movie leftovers.