- UK release: February 2025 (Apple TV+)
- Director: Scott Derrickson · Writer: Zach Dean
- Studio / distributor: Skydance Media; Crooked Highway; Apple Original Films
- Genre: Science fiction action romance / creature thriller · Runtime: 127 minutes (BBFC 15)
- Main cast: Miles Teller (Whiplash, Top Gun: Maverick) as Levi Kane; Anya Taylor-Joy (The Queen’s Gambit, Furiosa) as Drasa; Sigourney Weaver (Alien, Aliens) as Bartholomew; Sope Dirisu (Gangs of London, His House) as J.D.
- IMDb: 6.7 / 10 · Rotten Tomatoes: 62% critics / 74% audience · My rating: 8 / 10
Scott Derrickson made his name in the dark, and The Gorge is the first time he has stepped fully out of it. After the Sinister films and The Black Phone, you might expect another exercise in dread; what he has actually made is a genre splice that has no business holding together, a two-hander romance bolted to a monster picture bolted to a piece of cold-war spy hardware. It arrives quietly on Apple TV+ rather than in cinemas, which is a shame, because this is a film built for a big room and a good sound system. It is also, against the odds, a lot of fun.
The setup
Levi Kane (Miles Teller) is an American sniper, a man whose nerves have been measured and found acceptable, dispatched to a watchtower on the western lip of an unnamed gorge somewhere in eastern Europe. On the far side sits Drasa (Anya Taylor-Joy), his opposite number, posted by the other power that polices this place. The job is simple and absolute: watch the gorge, never cross it, never let anything come up out of it. The two of them are not meant to speak. The mist below them is not meant to be asked about. Naturally they start signalling across the divide, a whiteboard romance conducted at rifle range, and just as naturally the thing the towers exist to contain stops staying contained. What lives in the gorge is best left for the film to show you; the pleasure is in watching two very controlled people lose their grip on the rules.
The cast
The whole film rests on whether you buy these two, separated by a quarter-mile of bad air, falling for each other before they have shaken hands, and they make it work. Teller plays Levi as a man wound tight and slowly unspooling, the same banked intensity he brought to Whiplash now pointed at someone rather than a drum kit. Taylor-Joy is the livelier presence, all sharp angles and dry mischief, and she gives Drasa a watchfulness that pays off when the plot turns. The chemistry is the engine, and it is real; the long-distance courtship is more charming than the premise has any right to be. Sigourney Weaver turns up as Bartholomew, the handler whose briefings never quite add up, and she brings exactly the institutional menace the part needs, an old hand at playing people who know more than they are telling. Sope Dirisu is given less to do but lends the support scenes some weight.
The craft
Derrickson and his cinematographer Dan Laustsen treat the gorge itself as the third lead, a vast, fog-choked wound in the landscape that the camera keeps creeping towards. Laustsen shot John Wick and the del Toro films, and that eye for saturated, tactile gloom is all over this; the towers feel lived in, the descent into the chasm has genuine texture, and the creature design lands on the right side of grotesque without tipping into anything you would call horror. Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross supply a score that hums with unease and then opens up when the action does, the kind of soundtrack that makes a streaming film feel larger than its delivery system. Frederic Thoraval’s editing keeps the first hour patient and the second hour quick, and the gear-shift from slow-burn romance to full-tilt survival is handled more smoothly than the join should allow.
How it stacks up
The obvious touchstone is A Quiet Place, another high-concept creature picture built around a couple and a rule that must not be broken, though The Gorge is warmer and pulpier than that film’s grim hush. The romance-across-the-void owes something to The Adjustment Bureau, and the lonely-outpost science fiction, the sense of two operatives kept in the dark by the agency that sent them, recalls Oblivion. When the film finally goes down into the mist it brushes up against Annihilation, with its mutated, half-organic landscape, though Derrickson is after a leaner thrill than that film’s dread. It does not match the best of any of them, but it borrows intelligently and stitches its influences into something that feels like its own.
Critics versus the rest of us
Critics are politely divided, sitting around 62% on the Tomatometer, and the recurring complaint is that the back half over-explains itself; the more the gorge’s mythology gets spelled out, the less frightening it becomes, and a couple of late swerves stretch the goodwill. That is a fair hit. Audiences are noticeably keener, a touch above 70%, and I am with them. The mythology is the weakest thing here, but it is also the part you can shrug off, because what you remember is the two leads and the descent. IMDb users have parked it at 6.7, which feels low for how watchable it is.
Verdict
This is exactly the kind of film I rate higher than the consensus does. It has a strong central pairing, a striking world that the camera and the Reznor and Ross score conspire to make feel real, and a willingness to be sincere about its romance while still delivering as an action picture. The over-egged third-act lore keeps it short of the top tier, and it never quite earns the scale it reaches for. But it is propulsive, good-looking, genuinely charming, and the sort of thing I would happily put on again on a wet evening, which counts for a lot in my book. A confident, enjoyable swing that connects more often than it misses. 8⁄10.
Availability: Streaming now on Apple TV+, where it premiered. Watch it on the largest screen and loudest speakers you can manage; it was built for both.
Update
Added since this review first appeared: The Gorge has settled in as one of Apple TV+’s most-watched original films, the kind of streaming hit that travels by word of mouth rather than billboards, and the chemistry between Teller and Taylor-Joy is the thing most people bring up. Talk of a follow-up has circulated on the strength of those numbers. It remains an Apple TV+ exclusive, so the platform is still the only place to see it.
BBFC content advice
Rated 15 by the BBFC (classified 13 February 2025, Apple). The full category-by-category content advice could not be retrieved from the BBFC release page at the time of writing; the age rating above is confirmed from the BBFC record. Check the BBFC entry for the detailed ratings info. The notes may contain spoilers.
Source: British Board of Film Classification (bbfc.co.uk).
