j889 Sanctum is one of the best film about scuba diving, more to the point, cave diving. Cave diving unlike scuba diving require special skills: the way you move your fins, how you trim, and it requires additional equipment: primary, secondary torches, back up torches, helmet etc... This film depicts scuba diving and cave diving quite accurately. It shows the thrill and the danger involved, and it shows what's the moral and discipline, courage that's necessary for a good scuba/ cave diver. I'm a scuba diving enthusiastic myself. My friends lost someone in one of the diving trips. Practice and discipline are crucial for diving activities. There are just so many armatures going to difficult dive sites, and sadly that's exactly how accident happen. That's why when I see amateurs I always try to warn them about the danger involved.Now, about the film, As a skilled dive you can tell most of the actors, if not all are not skillful divers because they rarely obtain balance in the water, constantly kicking their fins. There is a tiny bit of problem with the beginning of the film: when Frank and Judas pass that restriction, even though they drop their large spare tank, as an experience cave diver, they should have smaller tank attach to their gear, and many cave divers bring spares of everything: mask, regulator, tank etc...With these flaws, this film is still one of the best film about diving.

Python Hyena Sanctum (2011): Dir: Alister Grierson / Cast: Richard Roxburgh, Rhys Wakefield, Ioan Gruffudd, Alice Parkinson, Daniel Wyllie: Overbearing and increasingly horrid cave diving film that uses the 3D gimmick to exhausted failure. It stars a host of little known actors who are introduced quickly before diving into the largest cave in the world. From there the place floods with a storm being no help to their quest. What is truly unfortunate is how this film claims to be inspired by true events yet it relies on stupid thriller clichés that mount towards one survivor. Director Alister Grierson does his best with the watery visuals and an overlong tunnel of caves but the cast do little more than shout over loud noise and die in accidents that might have been prevented had an common sense been used. Among the cast is Richard Roxburgh as the experienced explorer whom spends much time being right and fending off arguments. Rhys Wakefield plays his son who is an experienced climber. He spends much of the film arguing with his father and having to prove himself. This bickering is not half as entertaining as an episode of Jerry Springer. Ioan Gruffudd plays some outsider who takes video and pictures but how the screenplay handles his fate is total thriller bullshit. This all feels staged and phony from a narrative standpoint. Other characters are about as dull as the folks narrating their activities on fishing shows. Then there is the huge marketing regarding James Cameron as executive producer. It isn't like he directed it. Had he directed it then perhaps it might not have turned out to be the total toilet waste fiasco that it is. Score: 2 / 10

StuOz People are trapped in a cave.A disaster movie made in this century that is not totally swamped with CGI. Could it be? Yes...that makes this film a bit different and very welcome.This all seems rather human and well done. I was fine with all the actors involved. There were times when I was reminded of some 1970s disaster movie I saw decades ago.Filmed on a studio set rather than a real cave...but it fooled me. Perhaps this film will get the younger crowd running to DVDs stores wanting to see how the disaster movie genre first started in the 1970s. And that can only be a good thing.PS Most of the cast are in fact Australian

SnoopyStyle Master diver Frank McGuire (Richard Roxburgh) has bought his son Josh (Rhys Wakefield) along to explore the Espiritu Esa'ala cave system with their wealthy benefactor Carl Hurley (Ioan Gruffudd). It's a dangerous underground expedition that turns disastrous when a tropical storm pours rain down into the cave.The characters are completely forgettable. None of them provide anything compelling. There are a couple of interesting actors here but the rest are mostly unknowns. The action is interesting and looks realistic, but it's mostly all wet. I didn't see this in 3D. Maybe that could have saved this movie.