Director – Joachim Hedén, Screenplay – Nick Saltrese, Story – Andrew Prendergast & Nick Saltrese, Producers – Andrew Prendergast & Chris Reed, Underwater Photography – Eric Börjeson, Music – Patrick Kirst, Visual Effects Supervisor – Stuart Love, Visual Effects – Filmgate AB, Makeup Effects – Marie-Eglantine Pirson, Underwater Production Design – Thomas DeLord. Production Company – Picaro Films/Freebie Films/uMedia/Anamorphic Media.
Cast
Jack Parr (Noah), Kim Spearman (Sam), Julian Sands (Levi), Alexander Arnold (Brett), Arlo Carter (Logan), Erin Mullen (Riley)
Plot
Noah and his business partner Levi run a diving boat in the Virgin Islands. They locate the wreck of the USS Charlotte, which was sunken by a torpedo in 1944. Four of Noah’s friends then arrive to pay him a visit. When Noah mentions finding the wreck, Brett immediately wants to dive and see it, offering money, but Levi refuses. Noah then discovers just how badly in debt that Levi is and they agree to make the dive for $50,000. Noah leads the party down into the wreck. However, as they explore, they discover that there is a shark inside with them. With members of the party wounded and bleeding and with limited supplies of oxygen, they try to avoid the sharks roaming the area and make their way back to the surface.
Jaws (1975) created the Killer Shark Movie. It spawned a great many imitators. By the late 2000s, these had graduated to the deliberately ridiculous with the likes of Sharknado (2013) and a good many wilfully absurd imitators. The 2010s brought a growing body of killer shark films that are serious survival horror works focused around people stranded in shark-infested waters. The first of these was Open Water (2003) and sequels and was followed by The Reef (2010) and sequel, The Shallows (2016) and 47 Meters Down (2017) and sequel, along with a host of lesser budgeted efforts such as Adrift (2017), Great White (2021), Swim (2021), Maneater (2022), The Requin (2022), Shark Bait (2022), Shark Waters (2022), The Black Demon (2023), Blind Waters (2024), Shark Warning (2024), Something in the Water (2024), Fear Below (2025) and Into the Deep (2025).
The Last Breath comes from Joachim Hedén a Swedish cinematographer turned director with New York Waiting (2006). After a couple of other films, Hedén broached the survival film with the also underwater-shot Breaking Surface (2020). The Last Breath was a production made with an assortment of British. Belgian and Canadian funding and was shot in Malta.
The Last Breath was the last ever film made by Julian Sands, following his death in a climbing accident in January 2023. It is a rather ignominious effort for Sands to be remembered by – one where he comes with bizarre character quirks like being introduced knitting, a fake Liverpudlian accent, and an end where he is despatched by being devoured by the shark in one foul swoop and chomp.
Julian Sands in his last performanceKim Spearman trapped underwater in a wreck
The underwater sets looked cramped and claustrophobic, which was no doubt what was intended. The film certainly gets a jump when Arlo Carter is abruptly attacked out of nowhere by the shark. Joachim Hedén seems to be making an effort to make the diving scenes look authentic. On the other hand, there were some aspects that left me feeling decidedly dubious – like just how easily it would be to conduct emergency surgery on someone while both surgeon and patient are underwater wearing scuba equipment – although it is at least a sequence that generates some tension.
The early scenes with the party on the island and the mano-a-mano challenges about more money to dive on the wreck are tedious. The Last Breath gets more entertaining during the scenes where the party are trying to escape from the wreck and make it back to the surface where we get good tension generated from the various contrivations and shark appearances. There is a particularly grim scene where one of the party is trying to swim back to the boat as the shark appears only to abruptly find they are swimming with one leg bitten off.
