From its unimaginative opening, involving a dumb tourist falling to her death to the anticlimactic day-lit finale (if you get this far, you deserve some sort of Steve Irwin award), Black Water: Abyss will make you want to Crawl back into Lake Placid. To reiterate: if you’ve come for the croc, you’ll be sorely disappointed. If you’ve come for anything else… well, why did you come at all?
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
RogerEbert.com by Brian Tallerico
Black Water: Abyss is one of those movies that isn’t particularly good but may not have to be if you’re in the right mood.
This is paddling-pool-level entertainment.
The Playlist by Christian Gallichio
While Trauki’s film may not go down in the pantheon of killer creature features, like the similarly themed “47 Meters Down: Uncaged,” it’s a lean and effective B movie.
Given its tight dark spaces, opaque water and lunging menace, this movie has plenty of natural nightmare material that it deftly turns toward more atmospheric than rote jump-scare uses.
The Irish Times by Donald Clarke
Black Water Abyss is mostly composed of actors breathing heavily in studio tanks while torches bounce off dampened sets. The characters are dull, the tension poorly maintained and the outbreaks of violence deeply confusing.
Consequence by Michael Roffman
Black Water: Abyss is a low-stakes rollercoaster arriving at a time when we’re being barred from theme parks. If you’re looking for some thrills — and maybe even a little adventure — it’ll do the trick. The drama is exhausting, but the situational horror offers a nice distraction, even if we’re admittedly tired of watching people make stupid decisions.
Black Water is an entertaining enough film, although one based on an overused premise that’s been done better.