The Honeycut: ‘The Sand’ is a movie of lost potential

Bash at the Beach

I was really looking forward to watching 2015’s “The Sand.” I first came across it when researching “Piranha 3D” last summer. It seemed like a funny, schlocky B-movie that would be an entertaining watch. 

Because it was Labor Day Weekend, I wanted to end the summer with a bang on the “Midnight Terrors Podcast.” So, I chose to cover “The Sand.” Did it live up to my expectations? Or does it deserve to be left on the beach for the waves to carry it away? 

The Story

After a wild night of partying the night before, a group of college friends wake up on the beach to find all of their other friends have disappeared. They soon learn that if they touch the sand, it sucks them down and kills them. The group must figure out a way to get off the beach without being dragged under. The floor is lava, basically. 

Honey’s Cut

“The Sand” was enjoyable for the first 30 minutes or so. But man does it hit the wall hard. By the time the third act rolled around, I was so checked out, I could barely remember what happened. 

Maybe the biggest issue with this one is its identity crisis. From the beginning, with the montage of the party the night before, it seems like it’s going to be a goofy beach horror movie, like “Piranha 3D.” But then it insists on having melodramatic scenes that it just does not earn. I couldn’t tell if this wanted to be horror/comedy or a deadly serious survival movie. Either way, it fails at both. 

The humor. You know, a few lines were legitimately funny. But overall, the comedy is juvenile, redundant, and gets beaten into the ground almost immediately. The drama scenes are just as bad. These bland characters are mad at each other because of some love triangle or whatever. Does it really matter? 

Now, all that could be forgiven if the kills were good. They were not. We first see the sand swallow a bird. It didn’t look great, but I still had hope. Then the first guy dies. It is all CGI blood and gore. Cheap CGI. Very cheap CGI. I’m no connoisseur of special effects. But if your blood looks worse than PS1 graphics, I’m out. 

I’m not sure there is much anyone could have done to save this movie, except to rewrite the entire thing. At one point I thought it wouldn’t be so bad if they just eliminated the violence and made it more psychological. Maybe they took some drugs at the party and those are affecting how they’re perceiving everything. 

I also liked what my co-host Kevin brought up on the podcast. What if a ship spilled something and contaminated the beach, or if the government was keeping them there in some type of containment effort? Those all seem more interesting than what we got. 

All that being said, “The Sand” is far from the worst movie I’ve seen. For a film made on a shoestring budget, I have to give it some props. These characters are smart in the inventive ways they try to escape without touching the sand. And there are some decently tense moments where you’re rooting for one of them not to fall onto the beach. 

Honey’s Final Thought

While “The Sand” fails to deliver on… really everything, it does show us something I love about low-budget and independent horror. The stories are usually pretty original and sound awesome on paper. But without decent writing and a proper budget, the whole thing can fall apart fast, which is the part I don’t love. 

For example, I developed an affinity for the ridiculous “Return of the Living Dead: Necropolis.” The acting was so bad, it was good, and it took big swings. Machine guns strapped to a zombified super soldier? Roll it! 

However, with “The Sand,” the acting is competent enough to where the dialogue is just kind of boring. The humor felt like someone was trying too hard to be edgy and ended up being cliché. And the awful CGI made me lose all interest. 

I usually find a way to relate a movie, or the experience I had watching it, back to our current culture or provide a little social commentary. But “The Sand” is “The Sand.” Enjoy it. 

Oh, and it’s not actually the sand that kills people. There’s a giant jellyfish living under the beach that’s attacking everyone. So. Yeah.