There's Something in the Water
Four long-time friends catch more than they bargained for while fishing in the Gulf of St. Lawrence
when they snag a mermaid who doesn't want to play their games.
Mermaids are such a fun, cute mythos – chock full of fictional characters we all adore! There’s that bevvy of mermaids in Disney’s Peter Pan cartoon. And Daryl Hannah in Splash: remember her? On some nights, Tom Hanks surely does, too! Of course, there’s also Ariel of The Little Mermaid fame… both the animated and live action reboot.
Who doesn’t love Mermaids? In Julia Sauder’s There's Something in the Water, we meet bawdy pals Michael, Oliver, Grayson and Christian on a deep-sea fishing boat dubbed “Pussycat Montreal.” If the name isn’t enough of a clue, the boys’ less than G rated banter quickly make it clear they’d (metaphorically) “love” a Mermaid, too.
Slugging a beer, Christian ribs Grayson on his upcoming nuptials.
Christian pops the top off the beer and holds up the bottle in a toast.
CHRISTIAN
To Grayson. His bachelor days are over.
No more pussycat for you.
As for the rest of the trio? Busy trying to lure innocent little fishies to their doom, they’re just getting started – with the locker room talk cranked up to “ewwww”:
GRAYSON
Eh Christian, did you ever takedown
that puck bunny from Sorel?
Oliver pulls out a lighter and lights Christian's cigarette.
OLIVER
That chick with the giant knockers?
CHRISTIAN
Oh yeah.
She gave head like an American.
GRAYSON
An American from New Jersey
or from Oklahoma?
CHRISTIAN
Florida.
GRAYSON & OLIVER
Oooh.
Over at Michel, his pole twitches.
Get your mind out of the gutter! We’re talking a FISHING pole here!
Michael’s got a big one… a tuna, that is. One so muscular and determined to live that it drags him overboard into the sea.
Where Michael sinks under the waves. Oops. Thanks to that horrific accident, it looks like the quartet’s about to become a trio in need of a police report. Until…
A silver hand grabs Michael’s shirt, and pulls him up! As Michael breaks the surface, Oliver throws out a lifesaver and hauls him in. Whew. Good thing Michael regained consciousness and remembered to swim! Or… did he?
Though his pals didn’t see the owner of that silver hand, Michael swears someone – or someTHING – “fished” him out! Needless to say, his friends are sure he’s hallucinating. Until…
Oliver spots a hand in the water, too. It’s a Mermaid?!? Couldn’t be! Or – could it? If it is…
What’s left for a bunch of bored bachelors to do? They’ve seen (and done) almost everyone. But a MERMAID? As far as “conquests” go, that’s new!
But – how do you catch a Mermaid? She’s half-fish, Christian reasons. So why not use a lure? A resisting Grayson gets shoved overboard. A storm of flailing, cursing – and beer bottling throwing - later, the Mermaid surfaces. And the trap springs!
The Mermaid's luxurious hair floats all around her. A fisherman's net drops over her.
Panicked, she pulls at it. She SHRIEKS an unearthly wail, the gills on her neck WHEEZING.
Michel and Oliver pull the net up to the boat as Christian helps Grayson back on the boat.
The four men drag the squirming Mermaid up onto the deck. They take a moment to catch their breath.
GRAYSON
You made me bleed, you asshole.
Well, that’s not a pleasant way to spend a lazy afternoon!
Yet, there the boys are, with a captured REAL LIFE WILD Mermaid. In such a situation, what should they do next? Call the Inquirer? An Aquarium, at least?
Read and find out how this aquatic safari ends. Because by the conclusion of this gory very non-Disneyesque moral tale, at least some of these “fun-loving” “up-for-anything” boys are bound to find themselves chums… in a literal sense!
Given the boat setting, Julia Sauder’s There's Something in the Water isn’t for bare-bones budgets. But remember – even Spielberg’s Jaws relied on a lot of implication, vs. direct views of animatronic “Bruce.” For creative directors, just a touch of makeup, cutaways and lots of blood will transfix audiences – and give generations of swimmers a Creepshow style thrill!