Open Water

Shot on consumer digital video for around 130,000 dollars, with real sharks and no cages, and the horror is arithmetic.

A couple on a diving holiday surface to find the boat gone. That is the entire premise and the film is 79 minutes long.

Almost nothing happens for an hour. They float, they argue about whose fault it is, they get cold, they get thirsty in the middle of an ocean, and the jellyfish are worse than the sharks for most of it. The camera stays at water level, so the audience can see about as far as they can, which is nothing.

Chris Kentis and Laura Lau made it themselves over weekends across two years, insured privately because no studio would cover the shoot.

The bleakest thing in it is how ordinary the argument is. They are not brave, they are a couple who have been irritated with each other all week.