Deeper – A Descent into the Unknown - Fremantle Shipping News

Here’s our Editor, Michael Barker’s review of prize-winning documentary filmmaker Jennifer Peedom’s latest film, Deeper.

As the publicity for Deeper’s WA Premiere fairly warns –

Hold your breath. Thai cave rescue hero Dr Richard “Harry” Harris takes on his most perilous adventure yet in Jennifer Peedom’s latest nail biter (SHERPA, MOUNTAIN, RIVER). In a remote part of New Zealand’s South Island, Harry and his fellow underwater obsessives set out to dive what could be the deepest-dived cave system in the world. Controversially, they plan to use hydrogen as a breathing gas – its explosive nature adding to the many hazards the close-knit team faces.

Jennifer Peedom has been making amazing, nature-focused, prize-winning documentary films since 2008. Sherpa, her 2015 BAFTA nominated film, is perhaps her best known.

In Deeper, Peedom plunges us – literally and metaphorically – into the abyss that is the Pearse Resurgence on New Zealand’s South Island. Featuring Harry, and his 2018 Thai cave rescue mate Dr Craig Challen, on a record-breaking cave dive, the documentary chronicles their descent beyond 200 metres into a submerged world few have seen, let alone survived. It’s a journey of extremes: physical, psychological, and philosophical.

At the preview of the film I attended at Luna Leederville, I couldn’t help but overhear the couple in front whispering about the plot. “What’s the point of it all, though?”, she asked. Fair question. The film doesn’t offer easy answers. It’s not about treasure, science, or even fame. It’s about pushing limits—of breath, body, and reason. He answered: “Perhaps it’s a boys’ thing.” And maybe it is. (Although I’m told there is an ever-growing group of women deep divers.) The film records the kind of challenge that flirts with death, demands hydrogen gas mixtures to go even deeper, and leaves no room for error. Testosterone meets terror, you might say!

But for me Deeper isn’t just a macho thrill ride. Peedom’s lens lingers on the quiet moments: the pre-dive rituals involving Harry and Craig’s team of mates, the flicker of doubt in Harry’s eyes, Craig’s uncertainties, the eerie beauty of the cave’s submerged cathedral. There’s poetry in the pressure. And tension in every breath.

Would I do it? Not a chance. And plainly nor would the couple in front. But that’s the point. Deeper invites us to witness what we wouldn’t dare. To feel the pull of the unknown, the seduction of risk, and the fragile line between courage and madness.

It’s death-defying drama, yes. But it’s also a meditation on obsession, camaraderie, and the human need to go further – just to see what’s there.

And for Harry there’s more: a sense of personal accomplishment after having felt an outsider since boyhood.

Despite all the drama on the screen, I have to say, when the last of the credits had flickered from sight, I couldn’t help but reflect on Jennifer Peedom’s skills as a documentary filmmaker. She likely spent months understanding the technical and emotional terrain of cave diving – interviewing the divers, safety experts, and psychologists. And building trust with Harry and his team would have been essential. EThen later choosing what to show, when to reveal tension, and how to frame the emotional beats.

For me, Peedom got it just right. She writes and directs Deeper with the precision of a choreographer and the empathy of a novelist. She’s not in the cave, but she’s deep in the story – shaping tension, deep inside Harry’s head, teasing out meaning, and guiding the emotional descent.

Her outsider’s eye becomes our entry point. She asks the questions we might: Why risk it? What drives someone to go further? And in doing so, she turns a technical feat into a human drama.

The cave may be silent, but Peedom’s storytelling echoes loudly.

Great film. See it. 5 Stars.

Opening soon at Luna Cinemas with a Special Event Premiere on Sunday, 12 October at 3.30pm at Luna Leederville with a Live Q&A featuring Dr Richard Harris, SC OAM and Dr Craig Challen, SC OAM, Heroes of the Thai Cave Rescue | 2019 Australians of the Year.

By Michael Barker, Editor, Fremantle Shipping News

~ If you’d like to COMMENT on this or any of our stories, don’t hesitate to email our Editor.

~ WHILE YOU ARE HERE –