TRAPPED SISTERS: DTMWaGL #14
TRAPPED SISTERS: DTMWaGL #14
The first thing to know about this movie is that if you look it up on IMDb, it is called “12 Feet Deep,” so legally you have to put “12 Feet Deep” by the Front Bottoms on repeat for the duration of this recap. The second thing to know about this movie is that according to Lifetime, it is “based on true events,” which means that in real life, some people have been in a pool longer than they wanted to be. The third thing is the content warnings: we’ve got discussions of drug abuse, rehab, suicide, alcoholism, death by fire, and child sexual abuse. These trapped sisters, they’ve got problems.
The actual title screen of this movie could not dream of competing with the production logo
There is one set in this movie, and it is: a large public pool, in a town, somewhere. There are two sisters in this movie, and they are: Bree, swimming laps in a sensible black one-piece and gigantic engagement ring and furtively checking her blood sugar, and Jonna, also in a sensible black one-piece, reluctantly at the pool because it beats listening to their mom complain about her latest loser boyfriend. Jonna yells at some kids for asking Bree about the burn scars on her arms, Bree asks Jonna about being newly sober, like I said, they have problems. Some other people also have problems! Like the pool manager, who hates the pool and everyone in it and can’t wait to close early for the holiday weekend (I think it’s Thanksgiving? But only because they mention turkey a couple times), and the night janitor, who is caught stealing money out of wallets in the lost and found by the pool manager. The manager is very disappointed in her, having just sent a good report to her parole officer. I’m not sure the night janitor is ever given a name on screen (the subtitles have her lines spoken by "Female #1"), but the Wikipedia page says her name is Clara. It also says that the manager is played by Tobin Bell, best known for playing Jigsaw in the Saw movies. Jigsaw is in this movie, and he only gets like three minutes of screen time.
At closing time, Bree and Jonna prepare to head out until Bree realizes she can’t find her diamond ring, which she swears she put in her bag. Jonna spots it at the bottom of the pool and Bree dives in after it just as Jigsaw hits the button to bring the solid fiberglass cover over the pool. It’s stuck in a grate, though, and when Jonna dives in to help, her hair gets sucked into the same grate. The real villain of this movie is this grate. The pool cover closes over the sisters, and the manager doesn’t hear them or see their hands banging on it, and he goes home to his Thanksgiving (?) preparations. Well. I believe what we have here is some TRAPPED SISTERS.
This is the scene you need to get extremely acquainted with over the next hour fourteen
Bree and Jonna ineffectually bang on the pool cover and snipe at each other. Bree says they need to calm down and consider their options, and Jonna snaps, “you’re going to treat this like one of your corporate projects? Do I get a review after? Can I be the team leader?” so yeah we know who the fuckup in the family is, and it’s definitely not Bree. They do some reconnaissance around the pool and come up with a hole in the cover about the size of your hand, and a piece of plastic to try to grind away at the edges of it to make it bigger. Also, the grate that the ring is stuck in seems pretty heavy, maybe they can pry it loose and bang at the cover with it? These are all their ideas. Jonna does have some ideas about conversation topics, though, like: what do you think is the worst way to die? It’s gotta be being eaten by sharks, right? Bree points out that her fiance David will start wondering where she is, and Jonna retorts that it’s been an hour and he hasn’t called or come by. Yeah Jonna, it’s been an hour, that’s an acceptable window of time for an adult human. Maybe Bree stopped for ice cream, or to go to the library, oh my god remember going places and doing things, on a whim, for fun? I remember. Covid is the fiberglass pool cover, we are all trapped in this pool.
Anyway, Jonna has to do some backstory now. She tells her sister that the worst part of rehab was coming home and finding that Bree didn’t live there anymore, and Bree is like, well, you are an adult, and I am an adult, with a life outside of you. Jonna takes this as an opportunity to yell about how terrible Bree’s fiance is, and here are the facts we have about him: 1. His name is David. 2. He is a...person? Actually I don’t know that for sure. A griffin or a particularly dextrous and heteronormative oak tree could have purchased that ring for Bree. So, no, it’s just the one thing. Bree accuses Jonna of taking her ring out of her bag and throwing it into the pool, and Jonna doesn’t deny it. That’ll show her, Jonna! Bree makes another go at getting the ring, which is the other villain of this movie, out of the grate and it comes free this time. Hey, do you think you can cut fiberglass with a diamond? I bet you could! This does not come up at any point. They have a little piece of plastic that they’re ride or die for. While Jonna saws away at the hole, affecting it in no way, David finally calls Bree, but it’s to remind her that he’s got “that dinner” tonight and not to wait up. We have confirmation: he is an adult human male, and he is not going to rescue them.
Here is David, an adult human male, affianced to Bree. Do you want more facts? I do not have them.
The sun goes down, they’re still in the pool. The lights go out, they’re still in the pool. David calls again, they’re still in the pool. Jonna tells Bree that David sucks again, they’re still in the pool. Bree is looking a little worse for wear at this point, and she tells Jonna, for the first time apparently, that she is diabetic and was diagnosed three years ago. She needs an insulin shot, but that’s obviously not in the pool. What, do you think the pool is made of insulin shots? Grow up. Jonna, incredibly, accuses her sister of faking diabetes for sympathy (from Jonna? From David? From people in general? Unclear) but we saw her sticking her finger in the first scene, she is not faking her diabetes for sympathy.
Also, the sticky-fingered night janitor is here, but she’s in the back and doesn’t know about Bree and Jonna…….,,,,,....., yet.
Because the writer-director of this movie wanted to make a movie about “redemption, guilt, and the bond of sisterhood,” it’s time for some more traumatic backstory. While Bree takes her turn sawing away at the the little hole that they still see as their salvation, Jonna looks at the scars on her arms and asks if they hurt (no), and if she wants to talk about it (no). Because Jonna simply will not stop talking, we now learn that Bree witnessed the death of her father, when he came home drunk, lit a cigarette, and fell asleep. What better time to discuss this than: trapped in a pool.
As Bree finishes her story, which mercifully is not accompanied by a pointlessly graphic flashback, Clara the night janitor enters the pool area. Bree’s phone lights up with another call from David, and Clara finally notices the women in the pool as she saunters over to check out their bags and wallets. Rather than saying, “oh my goodness, these are some TRAPPED SISTERS, the water in there is 12 FEET DEEP, I should free them,” Clara decides to turn off all the security cameras around the pool. She sits next to the little hole they’ve been trying to widen, and tells them that her daughter got her hand stuck in a drain once, and it wasn’t even the stupidest thing she ever did. Clara also has some thoughts on their names: those are “weird New Age names, are you even from here?” Where do you think they’re from, Clara, Newageistan? Also, what? Their names are Bree and Jonna, not fuckin...I don’t know, Nevaeh and Ambrosia. So, no, Clara will not be letting them out. Instead, she will ask for the passcode to Bree’s phone so she can listen to her voicemails from an increasingly concerned David on speaker, and flip through the camera roll, criticizing Jonna’s tattoos in a cute selfie of the two of them. This is an opportunity for her, she tells the sisters. She just got out of jail nine months ago and things are really hard. She asks for Bree’s PIN, that’ll help her get back on her feet. At Jonna’s urging, Bree doesn’t give her the PIN. “Stubborn,” says Clara, “things don’t end well for stubborn girls,” and she turns off the pool heater. As the sisters realize what is happening, Clara wanders back to the pool and tells them she used to be just like them, a fashion snob who wore a fancy outfit to hang out at the pool, but then she lost everything. Again, Bree and Jonna are both wearing sensible black one-pieces, but I don’t know what’s in their duffel bags. Maybe Clara spotted some ball gowns in there, maybe they are just dripping with, uh, Swarovski crystals? Is that what fancy people wear? Bree finally gives Clara her PIN and she leaves the pool to go try it out, without turning the heater back on or untrapping the sisters. Okay, so it’s possible Clara is the villain of this movie, but my money is still on the grate.
Some time passes, it doesn’t really matter how much. Bree and Jonna are still arguing, but more quietly, because Bree is fading. Jonna makes another go at that rascally old grate and can’t dislodge it. “I’m useless,” she declares. “I’m a coward,” she adds. Then they argue, I did not make notes about what they argued about because it doesn’t matter. Bree asks Jonna what she’s really scared of, and Jonna replies, “monsters. They’re everywhere.” Bree tries to soothe her by saying she doesn’t have to be afraid anymore, but they are like currently trapped in a pool, and a person who could have let them out chose to insult and steal from them instead, so read the room, Bree. They sort of talk around the abuse their dad inflicted on them before he died in that fire, and then Jonna goes to work on the hole again, but Clara is like right there, watching them through the hole and listening to them discuss their childhood traumas like an extremely weird creep. Clara asks them if they think they’re special just because they’ve been through a lot, because she certainly doesn’t think so, and also Bree’s bank account only had eighty dollars in it, so fat lot of good that’s going to do her. Jonna screams that Bree needs her shot, she’s diabetic, and Clara replies that so what, she’s borderline diabetic herself, and her doctor says she doesn’t need anything, Bree is probably just lazy. This movie is on the Wikipedia page “List of films featuring diabetes,” but it should be on the Wikipedia page “List of films featuring people being extremely fucking weird about diabetes for no discernible reason”. Clara tells them that the world doesn’t owe them any favors and neither does she, so she might as well just leave them there to die. I’m not totally sure what Clara is getting out of this? It seems like a series of pointlessly bad decisions? That’s Lifetime, baby.
This woman co-hosted Loveline for 200 episodes, which I do not remember at ALL
Jonna has an idea! She’s going to take that piece of plastic she’s been sawing at the hole with and sharpen it into a shiv to stab Clara the next time she comes close. This does not seem like a plan that will result in their escape, but I understand the impulse. Jonna starts fake crying, drawing Clara in, and then screams, “go fuck yourself!” while stabbing her in the ear. Clara, bleeding quite a bit, retaliates by turning the pool’s cleaning system on so it belches chlorine out of the vents. Again, why does she want to kill them exactly? She does not know them. She does not know a single thing about them other than they have phones and duffel bags and that one of them just stabbed her in the ear. That last bit might have some bearing on it, actually, yeah. Deciding that she doesn’t want to kill these women she does not know after all, or at least not right now, Clara turns the chlorine jets off, but she wants Bree’s engagement ring as reward for a job well done. Bree hands it over, Clara tells her marriage is overrated anyway and leaves, and no one ever considers the possibility that they could have used the diamond to cut through fiberglass. Except me, I considered it a lot.
Bree dozes and has a dream that they got rescued, and wakes up to find Jonna holding the stabby sharpened plastic to her own neck, because even if they survive this very cold pool, she has nothing to go back to. Not like Bree, with her human male fiance, and her job (?) and her diabetes. Bree tells her they’re sisters and they carry each other, and Jonna agrees to not kill herself in a cold pool with a shard of sharpened plastic. That was easy.
Oh maybe Clara didn’t leave, because she’s just hanging out poolside, trying on Bree’s ring. A very worried David calls again and leaves a voicemail saying that if Bree doesn’t call back in five minutes he’s going to call 911. Clara’s jig is pretty much up at this point, and she goes to the hole to tell Bree and Jonna she’s not a monster, and Bree tells her that they’ve had a lot of time to think in this overchlorinated, freezing pool, and they’re really good people now, just FYI. Clara, fondling a heart-shaped locket around her neck, tells Bree that she used to have everything, just like her, and it can all go away in an instant. Boy I wonder if this has anything to do with the daughter she mentioned earlier, and why she was in jail! It doesn’t matter, she’s going to let them out of the pool now, and then she never wants to see them at the pool again. She’s gonna take their picture and post the Polaroid on a bulletin board with “BANNED: tried to murder :(” written on the white part. But! The code that Jigsaw the manager gave Clara to open the pool cover doesn’t work. She is going to murder these women whether she likes it or not. Clara runs out of the building, telling Bree and Jonna they’re on their own now, can’t call 911 because of all those crimes I did, see ya. She could at least turn the heater back on! Jesus.
The establishing shots of the pool got increasingly funny as the movie went on, like I might forget where they are
So now is the time to circle back on that whole “Bree saw their abusive dad die in a fire” thing, because if not now, trapped in this large, cold public pool, when? To make a long story short, right after she realized what their dad was doing to Jonna, Bree walked in on their dad as the fire was starting, and held him down to make sure he died, scarring her arms in the process. “I killed the monster,” she says. Good job, Bree. Jonna declares that it’s her turn to carry Bree, and dives down to the grate to make another go at it. She works a chunk of it loose and swims back to the surface with her big heavy prize. Guess what! The fiberglass breaks when you hit it with a big piece of metal! It’s cool that it took this long to get it loose. The whole length of the movie! Long enough for this redemption arc for the grate to really hit home. There’s hope for us all. Anyway Jonna breaks a hole wide enough to drag herself and an unconscious Bree through. Hooray! She finds Bree’s insulin in her bag and jabs her in the butt with it. I personally, me, Karen, I would have called 911 first, since there is a PHONE in the OFFICE, like twelve feet away from them, but that’s fine. Just jab the insulin in the butt. It also would have been a good idea to call 911 because now Clara is back, she’s here too, and she has a gun. She had a feeling they’d get themselves loose, they have “the fighting spirit, just like my little girl,” wow I think there might be some backstory there! It doesn’t matter though. Nothing matters. Jonna is so tired. I’m so tired. Clara got all the way to the car (all the way to the car???) and couldn’t stop thinking about what would happen to her if Bree and Jonna didn’t die, so she’s just gonna tie up all the loose ends. A happy ending for Clara! Jonna folds herself over Bree and cries until Clara feels bad enough to lower the gun and give her Bree’s ring back. Jonna finally, finally, calls 911, and tells Clara to leave.
This is the face you make when someone who has kept you trapped in a pool for several hours and tried to murder you and your sister shows up with a gun, after you thought you were finally rid of her, it’s textbook
Paramedics show up, and Bree drowsily tells Jonna she never doubted her. Jonna gives her the diamond ring. Now they’re getting married! It’s romantic. “How?” asks Bree. “We killed the monster,” replies Jonna. So did she,,, murder Clara? Where is Clara’s body? It doesn’t matter. They wheel Bree’s gurney out of the pool, and that’s the end of the movie! Sisters untrapped, mission accomplished, the end, thanks y’all!