Into the Blue (2005)

(Netflix Streaming, January 2016) While Into the Blue wasn’t favourably reviewed upon release, it’s the fast-paced thrills-and-romance tropical adventure that it wants to be. Who doesn’t love sympathetic protagonists being stuck between two criminal groups as they hunt a lost Spanish treasure and discover a downed plane filled with drugs? With Paul Walker in the kind of charming-action-hero role he did best, Jessica Alba looking remarkably good, director John Stockwell capturing immersive underwater sequences and clean cinematography, this is an unassuming and enjoyable B-grade thriller. (It’s quite a bit more memorable than the similar Fool’s Gold, for instance.) The Caribbean scenery is used judiciously, the underwater set pieces successfully navigate a line between excitement and ridiculousness, everyone is ludicrously good-looking and there isn’t much time to get bored as the plot goes from one thing to another. This is not a great movie, but it’s an enjoyable one for what it tries to do. Keep your expectations in check and the result will leave you smiling and possibly booking a flight to the Bahamas.