Whalefall review: Man gets swallowed alive by a whale in preposterous survival movie

Running time: 106 minutes.Rated PG-13 (peril, violent content, bloody images, some strong language, and thematic content).

In theaters Oct.16.The dumb movie “Whalefall,” about a man who gets swallowed alive by a whale, lost me countless times over its increasingly ridiculous oceanic voyage. But never more so than when the human meal, Jay (Austin Abrams), grabs a jellyfish and uses it as a flashlight while inside of Moby-Dick.

Even MacGyver would roll his eyes at that one. It’s best not to overthink a reboot of “Jonah and the Whale.” Yet turning one’s brain off to the extent that this preposterous movie — a combo of “The Poseidon Adventure,” “The Meg” and weirdly “The Lion King” — requires is next to impossible. If the ticking-time-bomb goal is for Jay to survive and, well, avoid emerging out the other end in an altogether unpleasant new form, we have to believe that he’s in real peril.But the setup and execution are much too brow-raising for that.How, during an accidental fish endoscopy, is Free Willy’s digestive tract — throat, stomach, etc.— so conspicuously well lit? Everywhere is illuminated even before Jay finds his absurd trusty bio-flashlight more than an hour into the film.

With groovy blues, greens and oranges, this thing’s esophagus looks like a 1970s basement.What are the strange anemone-esque appendages that attack Jay like he’s on a theme park ride? They appear less functional to food motility and more like genuinely pissed off cobras.How on Earth did he remember to bring an unopened package of steel wool on a spontaneous, emotion-driven scuba dive?There are a million such questions.And they’re all buzzkills, of course.

Perhaps the answer every one is: Shut up and just enjoy it.However, “Whalefall” is not a terribly exciting or engaging movie either, despite the enthusiasm of its star on the rise, Abrams. This is the second flick in a month (much better “Resident Evil” is the other) in which fun...