The Flood is a film about Jo Newman (Nicky Whelan), the Sheriff of a Louisiana police department, during a major hurricane. On account of the terrible weather, a truck full of prisoners has to stop in for the night. The situation becomes more complicated when a group of criminals arrives to break out one prisoner – Russell Cody (Casper Van Dien). And further complications are added by the swarming alligators into the flooded station.
So then both the cops and the criminals must work together in what’s essentially Assault on Prescient 13 but with alligators. Or Ghosts on Mars with alligators, if you prefer John Carpenter’s inferior sci-fi remake of his own film for some odd reason.
First off is the bad part. In their initial scene, every convict gets shown in freeze-frame while their name and charge are captioned; two things are wrong with this tactic. First it is unnecessary because at some point Jo does a roll call at the station where he says those facts aloud. Second, introducing characters through subtitles is also weak storytelling unless you do something fun like Feast did with it. That movie was great because each character had life expectancy.
When they first arrive at prison Jo tells them her father was sheriff before she took over and that she will shoot them as part of her ‘don’t f*ck with me just because I’m a woman speech’. That statement about her dad is the only bit of backstory she gets. Maybe that’s why they make Whelan pretend to be American while slipping into her Australian accent from time to time?
Unless they’re someone like Bob Hoskins, Hugh Laurie or Olivia Cooke who leave you thinking ‘wait you’re British’, directors should probably just allow actors use their natural dialects. However this is considered as shallow by MovieWeb especially if an actor still acts well despite having an accent.
The CGI gators in this flick are awful. The people behind it should have taken a leaf out of Jaws’ book, and had them onscreen as little as possible. If genre fans had to choose between bad CGI or bad practical effects, they’d probably pick the latter anytime. The problem is that bad CGI is a lot cheaper.
The movie plays out exactly how you’d expect it to. For instance, midway through the film, Jo strips her uniform off to a tank top, like any self-respecting heroine in an action or horror movie. However there is nothing inherently wrong with being derivative either – M3GAN for example demonstrated that as long as other elements such as acting or comedy can make up for it then your movie can be predictable too.
The acting in it is fine. There are no complaints about Whalen outside the thing with her accent, and Van Dien once again proves his mettle as a leading man who has charisma in spades. The cinematography and set design also have their moments; slow-motion takes over at times during the well-crafted claustrophobic setting though not always and some parts are just good like the human fight scene which could be down to personal taste.
The text contains several interesting aspects. Initially, Jo was involved in a fight with two of the inmates before they decided to live harmoniously for survival purposes. However, these two fellows were too big for Jo compared to her size and weight, but Jo managed to equalize this by using her surroundings and handcuffs like knuckles breakers. This is great that in a fight scene there are those who like some realism which does not make things too easy for the protagonists.
Is The Flood a good movie? No. Is it a bad movie? No. Is it so bad it’s good? Not either. The Flood is somewhere in between. It has been revealed by Director Bandon Slagle himself that this film was made just as entertainment for the audience without them needing to worry about anything related to that, this aim being fairly reached even if you will never watch The Flood again.Audience members would be better off renting the movie on demand or digitally for a bit of silly, simple fun when considered from this angle though.
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