‘The Gorge’ Review (Apple TV+)
Stars: Anya Taylor-Joy, Miles Teller, Sigourney Weaver, Sope Dirisu | Written by Zach Dean | Directed by Scott Derrickson
Drasa (Anya Taylor-Joy; The Northman, The Witch) is a sniper for hire and business has been good. At least until she finds out her identity has been compromised. Needing to drop out of site for a while she accepts a year-long assignment operating a watchtower overlooking a mysterious gorge that doesn’t exist on any maps.
Directly across from it is another tower, this one manned by Levi (Miles Teller; Top Gun: Maverick, Too Old to Die Young) a former Marine sniper. He’s been recruited by Bartholomew (Sigourney Weaver; Aliens, Cabin in the Woods) who tells him its a chance for him to pull himself out of the bottle and get his life back together.
Why are the towers there? That has something to do with what’s in the gorge, creatures referred to as The Hollow Men, after a poem by T.S. Eliot. Nobody knows what they are, but they wiped out a force of several thousand men sent to clear them out. The gorge itself is shielded from satellites and kept so top secret not even the US Presidents or Russian heads of state are aware of its existence.
Despite contact between the two towers being strictly forbidden, the two do just that. Levi eventually improvises a zip line and pays Drasa a visit. Unfortunately on his way back the creatures make another attempt to climb out and he falls into the gorge, she impulsively dives in to try and rescue him.
Director Scott Derrickson has come a long way since making Hellraiser: Inferno twenty-five years ago, He’s since made The Black Phone, Doctor Strange and Sinister to name a few of his credits. Unlike those films however, he didn’t write The Gorge, and is working from a script by Zach Dean (Fast X, The Tomorrow War).
For the first half hour Drasa might as well not exist, as the film focuses exclusively on Levi, from his briefing by the soldier he’s replacing, J.D. (Sope Dirisu; The Colony, Gangs of London) on he’s all we see until the plot needs Drasa to reappear. Then we get a cutesy montage romantic montage featuring Blitzkrieg Bop by The Ramones. Apart from a scene where The Hollow Men try scaling the sides of the gorge it feels like an old Cold War rom-com and is mostly kept afloat by the performances of the two leads.
Once they end up in the titular chasm things pick up pretty quickly. As the two of them face a horde of hostile creatures ranging from human/plant hybrids who ride similarly mutated horses to giant spiders with human skulls. It’s reminiscent of the Resident Evil franchise with a bit of Silent Hill and Annihilation thrown in for good measure. And, despite its derivative nature, it works quite well.
The creatures are grotesque while still being recognizable for what they once were and the settings, such as a church full of people who chose to take cyanide rather than suffer the fate of the others have a similarly unsettling look to them. And there’s plenty of action as the two try to find a way back to safety. That includes an accent up the side of the gorge that’s as exciting as it is improbable.
The CGI and green screen is surprisingly well done and shows just what can be done with these tools when you have the proper budget. The score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross who’ve previously scored Bird Box and Patriots Day among others and the cinematography of Dan Laustsen who has shot Brotherhood of the Wolf, Solomon Kane and Silent Hill among other films, provide the finishing touches on a well put together film.
Despite being slow to get started and running a bit long at just over two hours, The Gorge is a fun exercise in survival horror. It’s just too bad it went straight to streaming, it would have looked great on the big screen.
**** 4/5
The Gorge is available on Apple TV+.
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