Imagine going for a dive and ending up as the main course for one of the ocean’s largest creatures. It sounds like the setup for a bizarre nightmare but Whalefall turns that unsettling possibility into an unexpectedly gripping survival thriller.

Directed by Brian Duffield and adapted from Daniel Kraus’ novel, the film follows Jay Gardiner (Austin Abrams), a young scuba diver who enters the ocean in search of his late father’s remains. His expedition takes a terrifying turn when he is swallowed whole by a sperm whale, leaving him with limited oxygen, an increasingly hostile environment and very little time to figure out how to escape.

It is an unusual premise and the film wastes little time reminding viewers just how horrifying such a situation would be. Jay is trapped in an unfamiliar world where every movement could make things worse, and the possibility of being digested alive becomes a rather unpleasant race against the clock.