The Deepest Breath review – fascinating but muddled look at one of the world’s most extreme sports

Having drawn some fire already for premiering an oddly fittingly timed trailer during the hunt for the doomed Titan submarine, Netflix’s freediving documentary The Deepest Breath arrives unafraid to stir controversy. It’s an approach of the marketing that the final film itself somewhat shares, digging into a real tragedy in a way that can feel rather cynical at times, though without ever dipping into outright exploitative territory. It’s an angle that somewhat undoes Laura McGann’s film, which is an otherwise immersive and involving look at one of the world’s most extreme sports.

Through archival footage mostly shot by her subjects themselves, McGann follows the lives, achievements, and eventual romance of Alessia Zecchini, a world-record breaking champion diver from Italy, and Stephen Keenan, an adventurous Irish freediver who became one of the sport’s most sought-after trainers. It’s a whirlwind story, taking in over a dozen countries across four continents, but one that The Deepest Breath lets you know will end sadly.

It’s the way it lets you know that lets it down, though, playing weirdly coy about the incoming tragedy before a rather morbid final act, as if showing you a slow-motion car crash while telling you “oh, here comes the good bit.” It makes the whole thing hard to fully get on board with, obviously trying to avoid the sensationalism that Netflix docs are stereotypically known for but then still somehow falling into the same traps.

Thankfully, Alessia and Stephen are good company, and the interviews with other talking heads that show just how loved they are by their peers are touching, and their passion for their calling beams off the screen. While maybe more could have been made of the psychology of freediving (the film just sort of treats them like standard athletes without questioning just how borderline suicidal the sport is), the underwater sequences are incredibly affecting.

Every time they dive into the deep, and gorgeously blue, waters of the Caribbean or Mediterranean, it’s both visually stunning and terrifying – it’ll be hard to find a viewer whose chest doesn’t tighten in these moments. While I’m not sure it’ll have exactly the same effect on a laptop screen, it’s a powerfully claustrophobic feeling in a cinema, a feeling that makes The Deepest Breath, for all its flaws, more than worth your while.

The Deepest Breath is released in UK cinemas on 14 July and will stream on Netflix from 21 July.