TW: suicide
Andrew Walsh’s feature film, How Deep is the Ocean (2023), follows Eleanor (Olivia Fildes), a twenty-something-year-old drifter who can’t seem to make the right choices at any turn.
The film posits the all-too familiar and bittersweet questions, what does it mean to live versus to survive, and is it okay to survive if all you’re doing is travelling aimlessly? The protagonist Eleanor seems to be the epitome of a drifter. She’s young, and leaving behind an ominous past that seems to remain unexplored from the start — including a text from Rachel (voiceover by Dia Taylor) — up until returning to Adelaide, the very place she is running from.
How Deep is the Ocean is a very Australian film, from the setting to the people that inhabit the screen, everything paints a vignette of constant flux. When Eleanor gets a job at a local cafe but is almost instantly fired after she spits in the turmeric latte of a Melbourne man who is insulted at the mere insinuation that he looks vegan. Yet Eleanor does not seem to be offended by the customer’s attitude, more the fact he refers to her as a ‘backpacker’ in a passive-aggressive tone. This is where the plot begins to shine through the cracks, as we begin to witness the start of a series of bad choices made by the protagonist.
That night, Eleanor returns home to the room she is freshly renting from Roy, played by Cris Cochrane, who is a washed-up comedian drug dealer with an affinity for alcohol. His ‘friend’ Charlie (Adam Rowland) swings by, and Eleanor asks him to go for a drink to which agrees.
Throughout the film, there are a few time jumps which often detract from the time we as an audience get to spend time with the characters and understand their dynamics more deeply. Nonetheless, Walsh was still able to render me sceptical of Charlie despite the minimal portrayal of the date between him and Eleanor.
The next day, Eleanor is mugged and beat up until she’s left on the side of the road. Two guys pass her and leave her stranded, but she is able to drag herself home when she eventually comes to consciousness.
When Eleanor attends a job interview, she meets a girl called Zoe (Simone Oula) and they share swigs from a flask before the group interview. Although they hit it off immediately, they throw each other under the bus in the interview at the first given chance. Despite the fact that the interviewer is a douchebag who does not seem interested, Walsh seems to portray everyone in this film is acting in self-interest, or at least, their immediate self-interest which may backfire in the future
As the film progresses, it seems that Eleanor is a drifter in more than one aspect of her life. She moves about aimlessly, not thinking before making her choices or actions — she just seems to do whatever she feels like at the time. It’s clear Eleanor doesn’t know what she’s doing, as she jumps from job to job, and struggles with her relationships.
On one hand, she has Matt (Will Weatheritt), a friend she met on her first day who happened to be trying to rent the same room she moved into. Matt helps her get a job and get settled in the city, and has a large crush on her, who everyone seems to be aware of including her. She plays into it at times, but always ends up going back to Charlie, who ends up being married with a very pregnant wife.
After a series of poor decisions that stack like jenga blocks and topple over when her housemate, and only friend Roy, commits suicide. Towards the end of the film, Eleanor walks into the ocean only to emerge as a new beginning is marked as she physically and spiritually cleanses herself.
Although I did not entirely empathise with Eleanor or her choices throughout the film, I was still intrigued by her. She has a cold exterior, perhaps due to her ironic and somewhat sardonic humour, befriending people rather easily, even when it is detrimental to her social life.
How Deep is the Ocean (2023) is ultimately a fast-paced and engaging film without being too complex in its execution. It is also able to encourage self-reflection, both through its main character and off-screen as it leaves the viewer considering their own life choices.
With the ambiguous imagery, of the final shot, we’re unsure if Eleanor breaks her bad habits and realises that she needs to start living instead of just moving through life, but as we see the closing shots of the ocean, we can only be hopeful.
How Deep is the Ocean (2023) is available for rent and purchase via this linktree.
