There's a hollow familiarity at the bottom of The Gorge

In another life, The Gorge, with its famous young cast and Marvel director, might have been a highly anticipated theatrical action-horror release. Instead, it is being relegated to the annals of Apple TV+. Written by Zach Dean, who penned the expensive COVID streaming bust The Tomorrow War and the story for Fast X, The Gorge boasts a creepy premise and plenty of potential. But as that premise reveals an increasingly familiar story and setting, it’s hard to shake the feeling that filmmaker Scott Derrickson (The Black Phone, Doctor Strange) is serving mainly as a hired hand.

Levi (Miles Teller), an ex-military mercenary, has been hired by a deeply secretive, post-Cold War government program to keep watch over, yes, a giant gorge. Light on family and friends who would miss him, Levi agrees to the year-long assignment as Gorge Watcher, in a location so secret he has to be drugged on the helicopter ride over. But both sides of the gorge are kept overseen by contributions from the West and East. On the Russian side is Drasa (Anya Taylor-Joy). A contract killer herself, Drasa’s solitary lifestyle and ex-KGB father with a terminal illness grant her similar reasoning for taking on the unappealing position. 

Levi learns from J.D. (Sope Dirisu), the Gorge Watcher Levi is relieving, that he is now in charge of keeping what’s in the gorge from escaping: creatures previously dubbed the “hollow men” (like the T.S. Eliot poem, Levi recognizes, because he is a man of letters). It’s a bit deflating, narratively, to receive immediate transparency regarding the mysterious creatures in the mysterious gorge, even if it’s part of the plot, because ultimately the “big secret” about the gorge is easy to predict anyway. For now, nobody knows what these hollow men are, but the Gorge Watchers’ job is to keep the creatures from breaching the surface. And while there is a strict no-contact rule between the Gorge Watchers, a friendship quickly kindles between the two bored surveillants with no other connection to the outside world but each other—especially when Levi realizes that his counterpart is a sexy lady. 

The two write notes to each other on oversized sheet paper and use their high-powered binoculars to read them, maintaining a cutesy rapport through dancing, drinking, and playing chess. But their attraction is too strong, and when Levi notices Drasa crying on Valentine’s Day, the chivalrous merc is compelled to fashion a zipline across the gorge so that he can be with her. Both actors are far from giving their best work, but they’re not without their charms. Teller is very much a stock, hardened military guy with a heart of gold; Taylor-Joy is a much less emotionally aloof career criminal, whose warm relationship with her dying father reflects a desire for connection. Perhaps at odds with her profession, Taylor-Joy gives Drasa a light-hearted, playful nature that draws Levi out of his shell. It creates an undeniable—if simple—sweetness around the pair’s symbiotic relationship, keeping one another company while just out of reach.