TL;DR – The oddest meet-cute I have ever watched, which could have been interesting if that narrative was there to support it.

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene.

Disclosure – I paid for the AppleTV+ service that viewed this film.

The Gorge Review –

When you have been poorly sick for a while, it is hard to get that motivating spark going again. The more you are away, the more content you miss and the deeper the backlog gets. But sometimes, it is best to just dive headfirst into something and see what happens, which is what we did with our film today.  

So, to set the scene, Levi (Miles Teller) is a very successful sniper who has been out of the Marines for several years, working for private military contractors until he was deemed unfit to serve. He didn’t have a reason or drive to contest the results, but maybe an old spook that could command the Army around might give him that drive. He is taken to an undisclosed location in the middle of a no-fly zone, so secretive that they have scanners to stop it from being seen by satellites. Western powers control one side, the Eastern powers control the other, and there is one person on each side. But they are not stopping people from getting into the gorge. Oh no, they have to make sure what is in the gorge never comes out.   

There are a lot of interesting things happening in this film that were fascinating to watch. The opening set up with two watchtowers looking out over the gorge, checking out both what is happening on the other side and what is happening within, is a fascinating visual construction. Add in the brutalist watchtowers, with their mismatched accumulated furniture and oddly high-tech munitions, and you get the groundwork for an interesting story. Adding to this, Miles Teller and Anya Taylor-Joy work pretty well together, even though they communicate via whiteboards and sniper scopes for most of the film. This might be the oddest meet-cute that I have watched since that zombie love story film.

Once we get to the titular gorge, you can feel the visual inspirations with a dash of Strange Things, The Expanse, and a heaping pile of Annihilation. The Hollowmen, also being what if the fish monsters from Pirates of the Caribbean were plant-based instead, was an interesting choice. However, much of the sequences inside the gorge suffered from bad Silent Hill-itus where the smoke/fog/environmental effects don’t make things feel claustrophobic, but more make it feel like it was filmed on a small green screen set. Some of the purpose sets, like the church, help alleviate some of this, but they always come back to it.

Finally, the biggest issue with the film is the story, which is a haphazard mess at the best of times. You understand the reason why they were secretive at the start of the film; the moment you start hearing anything about the situation they are in, it makes less and less sense. A secret chemical weapons facility between the Americans and the Soviets that was still working after WW2, I think not. The more background we get, the more cracks we see in the narrative. Add to this one of the most lacklustre bad guys that wastes Sigourney Weaver’s time, the lack of any real motivation for characters, and tonal whiplash aplenty.           
In the end, do we recommend The Gorge? Look, it does have its moments. Indeed, the individual components of this film work quite well. However, when you add them all together, you get a completely missed opportunity, or at least a movie that may need some more time in the scripting phase before production. Have you watched The Gorge? Let us know what you thought in the comments below. If you liked The Gorge, we would recommend to you 10 Cloverfield Lane.

By Brian MacNamara: You can follow Brian on Twitter Here, when he’s not chatting about Movies and TV, he’ll be talking about International Relations, or the Solar System.

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Credits – All images were created by the cast, crew, and production companies of The Gorge
Directed by – Scott Derrickson
Written by – Zach Dean
Music by – Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross
Cinematography by – Dan Laustsen
Edited by – Frédéric Thoraval
Production/Distribution Companies – Apple Studios, Skydance Media, Lit Entertainment Group, Crooked Highway & AppleTV+
Starring – Miles Teller, Anya Taylor-Joy, Sigourney Weaver, Ṣọpẹ́ Dìrísù, William Houston, Kobna Holobrook-Smith, James Marlowe & Ruta Gedmintas
Rating – Australia: M;