The Rift Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.5
Audio		4.5
Extras		4.0
Overall		4.0

The Rift Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Brian Orndorf September 25, 2016

What was it about the years 1989 and 1990 and movies concerning unknown threats from the deep blue sea? “The Rift” (also titled “Endless Descent”) is a graduate from the genre class, joining fellow chillers “Leviathan,” “Lords of the Deep,” “The Abyss,” “The Evil Below,” and “DeepStar Six” in an attempt to find wonders and worries associated with initially unexplained oceanic events hitting a group of disparate, anxious personalities. “The Rift” follows the suspense routine, but it doesn’t bring much in the way of cash to pay for visual highlights, emerging as a low-budget effort that tries to do much with very little. Monstrous activity and submarine voyaging are reduced to semi-silliness in the picture, but director J.P. Simon doesn’t completely give up, managing to cough up an entertaining horror endeavor that’s competently cast and intermittently exciting with lowered expectations, delivering a satisfying but unremarkable “Aliens” knock-off that’s big on gore and panic once limited production expanse is established.

Wick (Jack Scalia) is a submarine designer responsible for the creation of Siren-1, which is now lost somewhere at the bottom of the ocean. Called into duty to help find the missing vessel, Wick is paired with navigator Robbins (Ray Wise), bio-geneticist Nina (Deborah Adair), and a small group of NATO officers, about to enter the unknown under the leadership of Captain Phillips (R. Lee Ermey). Launching the Siren-2 from Norway, the crew tries to get along during the journey, but tensions rise with Phillips’s brusque manner and Wick’s lone wolf attitude, determined to clear his name and prove the sub was tampered with, fitted for nuclear weapons without his consent. Following a distress signal, the Siren-2 enters an abyss, soon discovering they’re not alone in the dark, facing the wrath of hungry monsters.

“The Rift” takes a few moments to settle in, spending introductions is exposition mode, establishing Wick as a hothead genius, with Scalia trying out his best Kurt Russell impression. It’s a bit of a reach to buy Wick as a master of subs, but it’s only the first of many whoppers the production asks audiences to digest, soon reducing the scope of the picture to the Siren-2 set, where Wick and Phillips butt heads as the chain of command is established, and we meet various members of the crew, including Dr. Carlo (Alvaro Labra), navigation officer Ana (Ely Pouget), and Joe (John Toles-Bay), who’s the sassy comedic relief of the feature. The unit is sent to find Siren-1, but tempers are sorted out first, keeping Wick on edge and the crew restless as the sub dives deeper into the ocean, with its first challenge walls of ice that require precise navigation to survive.

The special effects for “The Rift” aren’t richly detailed, finding the ice wall odyssey looking like a toy sub winding through cardboard, but the production survives, almost embracing its B-movie origins as it arranges action with miniatures, depending on the cast to sell any possible urgency. The ensemble does their best with dramatics, but it’s fun to watch the actors fiddle around with Styrofoam guns and clearly artificial doors (watch how carefully they handle locks), laboring to generate a sense of reality to pure absurdity.

Sub tensions take up the first half of “The Rift,” following the crew as they reach their destination. Those expecting the picture to keep up its slow-burn approach might be surprised by the movie’s neck-cracking shift into a gore-a-thon, with the crew suddenly confronted by the mutated evil that exists in the deep. Wisely scripting the action out of water, action cranks up gunplay as a search party is attacked by miniature monsters, which are soon supported by larger threats, keeping “The Rift” loaded with puppetry and goopy innards. The effort gets noticeably more violent and expository, but also engaging as panic sets in and betrayals commence, permitting Simon to beef up the work with more visceral highlights.

The Rift Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Boasting a "Brand New 2016 HD Master, "The Rift" arrives on Blu-ray with an AVC encoded image (1.67:1 aspect ratio) presentation that looks moody but clear, pulling the film out of the depths of crummy looking VHS releases. Detail is strong, clarifying facial particulars, set ornamentation, and cave inspections, while monster work is appropriately textured, delivering goopy, rubbery features. Colors are refreshed to satisfaction, leading with steely blues in submarine interiors, while warning lights are powerful, almost giving the effort a black-lit look. Skintones are natural. Delineation is strong. Source is in terrific condition, with only a few bits of debris detectable.

The Rift Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The 2.0 DTS-HD MA sound mix comes through with a straightforward genre design. The difference here is found in dialogue exchanges, with almost the entire movie looped (poorly too), securing clarity but also revealing an artificial quality to dramatics. Scoring is sharp with comfortable instrumentation, carrying moments as required. Sound effects offer nice definition, preserving submarine travel and water pressure, while monster antics have growly snap. Atmospherics are also satisfactory, getting a feel for tighter spaces and strange environments.

The Rift Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Interview (24:12, HD) with actor Ray Wise explores his experience with casting and "The Rift" shoot, facing a Spanish-speaking crew and zero budget. Wise speaks fondly but carefully about his co-stars, and he's just as diplomatic when discussing the special effects, which clearly falls below his standards, revealing a touch of disappointment with monster creations. Wise goes on to share a few anecdotes about his career, remembering his time on "Swamp Thing," "RoboCop," and the television series "Reaper." Strangely, talk of "Twin Peaks" is avoided.

• Interview (31:05, HD) with Jack Scalia highlights his initial meeting with Dino DeLaurentiis, who simply wanted to know if the actor liked the script before immediately casting him in the lead role. Scalia also discusses director Simon's insistence that Wick smoke throughout the movie, which restarted Scalia's habit that he successfully kicked seven years earlier. An Old Hollywood type, Scalia has plenty of anecdotes to share, while also recalling the highlights of his time on "The Star Maker" (with Rock Hudson), "Fear City," and the maligned 1992 television series, "Tequila and Bonetti," which was revived for Italian audiences in 2000.

• Interview (7:26, HD) with R. Lee Ermey is a short recollection of production experiences from the actor, who is pretty open about his distaste for the director and movie, ranking it as one of his worst. Expectedly wily, Ermey has some choice language to share concerning co-star Wise and the feature's ridiculously limited budget.

• And a Trailer (1:45, SD), billed as "Endless Descent," is included.

The Rift Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Highlights of "The Rift" are located accidentally, finding the picture's concentration on visuals it can't pull off more of a distraction, keeping attention on dismal-looking monsters and unconvincing underwater imagery instead of the cast, who do a much better job communicating escalating tensions. It's not particularly effective as a mystery and scares are non-existent, but as functional B-movie entertainment, "The Rift" has a certain energy that keeps it together, though try not to focus on the monsters. The humans are far more convincing.