Film Reviews

The Water Horse

• Rating:
• Director: Jay Russell
• Starring: Alex Etel
• Details: USA / UK / 111mins (PG)

While wandering the beach near his Scottish home during WWII, young Angus (Etel) discovers an encrusted egg on the shore of Loch Ness. Intrigued, he brings home where it hatches into an odd-looking aquatic creature. Angus hides it from his mother Anne (Watson) in his father's tool shed, but when the creature, which he names Crusoe, grows by the day, Angus has no choice to return it to the sea. However, the army - under the command of David Morrissey's stiff upper lip - who are protecting the loch, mistake it for a German sub and the locals are determined to get a picture of it... Echoes of E.T. (a boy and his otherworldly friend), The Iron Giant (a boy and his otherworldly friend vs. the military) and Free Willy (you get the idea) pervade The Water Horse, but it fails in reaching those emotional and sentimental heights (okay, not so much Free Willy but definitely the other two). It's a fairly predictable affair, saved only by the performances and the excellent special effects that render the monster believable - a must in a family film like this. Adapted from Babe scribe Dick King-Smith's novel, the plot glosses over what the book, presumably, delved into: handy man Ben Chaplin's issues with Morrissey's army captain are touched on but never explored; ditto his attraction to Anne and his father figure role to Angus. The connection between Angus and Crusoe, however, is never in doubt and The Water Horse, when it wants to, hits all the right notes.

Review by Gavin Burke