Open Water 2: Adrift

A group of friends sets off on Dan's sleek yacht for a weekend escape. The open sea surrounds them as they settle into sun and laughter, trying to leave worries behind. Amy, already fearful of the water, keeps a wary eye on the horizon while pretending everything is fine.

Amy and Dan remain on deck with their infant daughter Sarah while the others swim. Amy insists on keeping her life jacket on and clings to memories of a childhood trauma. Dan speaks softly of safety, but his tenderness accidentally nudges her toward the water, heightening the tension between fear and closeness.

The group heads into the water, but the ladder to reboard is never lowered. The deck is slick and the climb becomes a perilous struggle as they fight to haul themselves up. A passing teenagers' boat offers nothing but a friendly greeting, leaving the friends more exposed than ever.

A phone tangled in Zach's clothes rings briefly with the sound of birthday celebrations before it sinks. Michelle volunteers to rescue it, but the device dies and slips away into the depths. The loss underscored that every lifeline has a shrinking window as fear tightens its grip.

With no solid handholds, they fashion a rope from their swimsuits to haul themselves over the gunwale. The plan is clumsy and dangerous; Zach goes first, but the improvised rope snaps under the strain. The group stands exposed, soaked and vulnerable as the sea closes in.

James dives underwater toward the propeller, hoping to remove it or fashion a tool for escape. He drops the knife, retrieves it, and panics as the peril intensifies. A collision with the hull knocks him unconscious, and he surfaces with a skull fracture and bleeding.

Zach, driven by desperation, swings a knife to slash at the hull in a bid to climb. Dan intervenes, leading to a violent struggle in which Zach wounds himself by stabbing his chest. The pool of fear widens as the group realizes the dangers within as well as without.

Overwhelmed by the odds and the scent of nearby sharks, Michelle begins to swim away from the others. Dan dives after her in a last-ditch effort to reach her, but she remains unseen in the depths. The fate of Michelle becomes a haunting uncertainty on the storm-bent sea.

Zach's body eventually drifts away, dead from blood loss, carried by the current. Lauren clings to him for a moment longer before letting go, a wave of guilt and isolation washing over her. Their losses deepen the sense that the makeshift family is breaking apart.

Dan reveals that he doesn't actually own the yacht they thought belonged to him. The confession lands as Lauren chooses to keep fighting, refusing to surrender to the sea. The revelation fractures trust and adds another layer of peril to their dwindling options.

As night deepens, James dies from his head injury, and Dan's search for the missing knife yields nothing. A broken mask lens is wedged into a crevice near the side door to secure a handhold on the ladder. Amy, bleeding from the climb, rises and tends to Sarah on the deck.

Amy climbs onto the deck by standing on Dan's shoulders, her hands bloodied from the earlier climb. She reaches the gunwale, pulls herself up, and tends to Sarah left crying on the lower deck. The moment is a tense, lifelike balance of hope and fatigue.

In a last act of resilience, Amy cannot abandon Dan and plunges back into the water to save him. Their mutual rescue becomes a testament to family endurance in the face of the sea's cruelty. Together they push toward the surface and any possible shore.

A fishing boat notices signs of recent occupancy—a spread of the ladder and a life ring left behind. The yacht seems empty, and a faint cry of Sarah remains from below. Amy stands on the fishing boat, heartbreak etched on her face as she surveys the silent vessel.

Dan lies hidden beneath a towel on the deck, his fate unclear. The ocean remains silent, and the film closes with Amy on the fishing boat, a mask of heartbreak as she surveys the silent vessel and the sea that keeps its secrets.