We’re finally kicking off the 2015 movie season here at Irreviews with Black Sea, a movie in which Jude Law plays ex-navy guy piloting submarines for a marine salvage outfit, until he is unceremoniously downsized in the first scene of the movie. Many of his buddies suffered the same fate at the hands of this particular corporation, and they decide to go rogue, accepting a commission from some anonymous rich guy to pilot an old submarine into the Black Sea and investigate a Nazi sub wrecked at the bottom that might carry hundreds of millions in gold (a “pay off” from Stalin to Hitler that never made it, we are told). The wreck is not in international waters, hence the stealth.

I don’t want to be too hard on this film, because honestly I enjoyed it more than Birdman (at least Black Sea has a story) and The Imitation Game and Mr. Turner and Whiplash. It’s a fairly entertaining B-film, perfect for a long airplane ride. The script is badly rushed in the beginning (they’re obviously in a big hurry to get this submarine stranded at the bottom of the sea), and there is too little dialog and too little interesting detail about submarines or deep sea salvage operations. But there is some detail, and even if certain plot elements are a bit strained, the whole thing somehow holds together, barely. It helps that a few of the key actors actually turn in fairly good, understated performances, including Law and Michael Smiley, who everyone will remember as Phil Squod in the fantastic rendition of Bleak House back in 2005 – very nice to see this fine actor getting some work!

But it’s really not a very good movie. From the moment Jude Law assembles his team, you can see the entire narrative opening up before you. He hires a famously skilled deep sea diver who is “crazy” – you know how that’s going to turn out! He hires another diver who is a really nice, likable old man – you know how that’s going to turn out! He replaces a crew member at the last second with some goofy dimwitted teen who turns up out of the blue, totally unskilled – you know how that’s going to turn out! They include a bunch of surly Russians in the crew who don’t speak English – you know how that’s going to turn out! Everything in the story happens basically as you guess it will; only the order of events is unpredictable. Honestly, this script feels like it was conceived and written in an afternoon.

I should add that there is a vague working class sentimentality pervading this film which is unusual in modern cinema, a good deal of angry talk about “rich fuckers”, “they threw us away like trash”, “that fucking banker”, and so on. This might have added a refreshing dimension, had it been developed at all. But none of this talk leads anywhere concrete; in fact, in the end it struck me as just so much filler.

Black Sea: It is what it is. If you like this kind of thing, and just want a fun diversion, go for it.