Into The Blue 2: The Reef opens much the way it will inevitably end. With a splash! But in this case, that splash is more along the lines of a body being thrown overboard, as the film sluggishly attempts to navigate tempestuous waters. It begins underwater as two mysterious boxes are thrown overboard a speeding boat and gently float to the sandy ocean floor, and we are told through text on screen that millions of dollars of treasure lies undiscovered all over the world, just waiting to be found.

Dani (Laura Vandervoort) and Sebastion (Chris Carmack) are two wildly-in-love diving instructors in Hawaii who long to control their fate and spend their time searching for treasure in the high seas rather than teaching vacationers to dive. Over the next 20 minutes, we are given a typical slice of island life as Dani and Sebastion dive and cavort in the water, deal with their feisty friends, and hit the beach to play volleyball.

Eventually one starts to wonder if they're ever going to actually get around to letting the audience in on the plot, which plays second fiddle to the all-important beach movie cliché: Hot girls in bikinis. After enough jiggling has occurred, two mysterious Europeans approach the diving instructor-couple and ask them for a week of diving lessons as they are hoping to locate some famous local buried treasure. Turns out Sebastion has been looking for this same treasure for a long time, and so, he quickly agrees to help them.

It must be noted that Audrina Partridge from The Hills makes an unintentionally goofy appearance early in the film as the jilted girlfriend of a local party boy. Her acting hasn't improved in the transition from reality television to, well, whatever this is.

It's kind of twisted that we're not even introduced to the actual plot of the film until about half way through this film. So intent is the director upon furnishing the audience with bumpin' tunes and eye candy galore. No less than five women at different times in the film fully expose their breasts, and this is in addition to the hundreds of beach beauties in the barest of bikinis. This is real gluttony, a ridiculous amount of nudity, for a film that seems to take itself rather seriously as it attempts to demonstrate true love, loyalty, friendship, and other such admirable values in the lives of Dani and Sebastion.

The two become friendly with Azra (Marsha Thomason) and Carlton (David Anders), the Europeans, as they spend their days diving, and eventually the reasons behind the Europeans mysterious appearance are revealed. Carlton is a sort of smuggler, looking for some cargo that was dumped overboard in a recent transaction. He offers the couple a great deal of money in exchange for their services, enough money to start a new life free of worry, in one telling exchange, which can give you an idea of the conversational skills being artfully applied here to determine truth or falsehood.

Dani: "What's really in those containers?"
Azra: "You think it's drugs?"
Dani: "The thought had crossed my mind."
Azra: "It isn't drugs, I promise you."

This answer seems to satisfy everyone, at least until Dani and Sebastion later decide to get a closer look for themselves at the contents. In what can only be classified as an affront to rational thought, they appear to be taken by surprise when the Europeans double-cross them and manipulate the two into helping them search for the missing containers. From here on out until the expected end, we are treated to some hard-hitting action, fist fights, gun fights, and a chase scene that is meant to remind you of Run Lola Run. (More specifically, it reminds you that there are other films you could be watching.)

Ultimately, Into the Blue 2: The Reef just isn't able to commit. The movie begs to be taken seriously, yet all the while wants to hold its audience captive with boobs and blaring hip-hop music as sexy people prance about underwater. So, in one sense, it's worth seeing if you enjoy all those things in one convenient location. But between the acting and the ever-shifting plot trickery, the one thing this film can't be is coherent.

As far as DVD features go, the good people at MGM have left us with a twelve-minute featurette on diving; the cast learns to dive and they discuss the difficulties of using equipment properly as well as communicating and directing under water. This was actually quite interesting and presented with a real eye for an interesting and concise storyline, unlike the majority of the film itself. Also included was a seven-minute featurette on how they shoot a running sequence that occurs late in the film. It was nice to see a bit of "movie magic" on display, that great behind-the-scenes information that is sometimes the very best part of the movie.

Into the Blue 2: The Reef is available on Apr 21, 2009 from MGM.

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