On Screen: “Below”
Below
The spooky season is here — and Netflix doesn’t disappoint with “Below,” a creepy, six-part creature feature set in a rugged, remote fishing village.
Back in 1985, nine-year-old Calvin Penney (Azriel Dalman) and his kinfolk were forced to relocate from a tiny, isolated island called Little Pot Rock in the Canadian province of Newfoundland to nearby Snook’s Arm, a slightly larger island.
Precariously transporting their house on a barge behind them, the Penney family’s motorboat encounters so much unexpected turbulence that young Calvin is forced to cut the tow rope, leaving his father to drown.
Cut to 40 years later — adult Calvin (Josh Hartnett) is still haunted by that guilt.
With fishing bans in effect and the Arctic permafrost thawing, hardworking Calvin now earns a meager living by collecting big chunks of floating ice from nearby glaciers and selling them to a local vodka distillery.
But Calvin, a single father of three (Charlie Heaton, Ruby Stokes, Rohan Campbell), plus his harbormaster sister Ruth (Willow Kean), is facing a local dilemma: because of the dwindling population and lack of jobs, townspeople are being offered hefty checks to relocate once again.
“I’m not moving an inch,” Calvin insists. “I’m never leaving this place.”
But strange things start happening. Calvin brings in a chunk of ice that’s so oily and smelly that the vodka company won’t buy it. At the same time, a Portuguese fishing trawler disappears without a trace — then body parts start washing ashore.
Suddenly, overnight, a huge iceberg appears in the harbor. But it’s no ordinary iceberg. It stinks of ammonia and is accompanied by a dangerous sea creature, a cephalopod (giant squid), according to marine biologist Dr. Fonda Howander (Mackenzie Davis) from the Ocean Science Center in Seal Cove.
Created by Jesse McKowan (“The Umbrella Academy”), combining history with mythology, this is a terrifying tentacled thriller set in an ominous ocean.
Having carefully studied Canadian radio’s “The Fisheries Broadcast,” Josh Hartnett (“Verity”) captures the distinctive coastal accent — and subtitles help the rest of us.
On the Granger Gauge of 1 to 10, “Below” is a sinister, seafaring 7 — ideal for binge-watching with all six episodes of the limited series streaming on Netflix.
Susan Granger is a product of Hollywood. Her natural father, S. Sylvan Simon, was a director and producer at M.G.M. and Columbia Pictures. Her adoptive father, Armand Deutsch, produced movies at M.G.M.
As a child, Susan appeared in movies with Abbott & Costello, Red Skelton, Lucille Ball, Margaret O’Brien, and Lassie. She attended Mills College in California, studying journalism with Pierre Salinger, and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with highest honors in journalism.