Oct 01, 2016
It's getting harder to come up with introductions to these reviews. I don't feel that you can just head straight into your thoughts about the film. It's like a completely jarring, like a comedy film suddenly throwing you into melodrama without actually setting up properly first. I've never claimed to be good at this, there's many people here that do such a better job at actually writing some pretty damn well-thought out reviews and I don't actually do that. My stuff is more stream-of-consciousness. I write down what comes to mind. If it sounds good, then great, if it doesn't then just as well. As if you couldn't tell, this is a hobby for me. I do it because I find it fun and because it gives me something to do. Sometimes it becomes a bit of a chore in that I have to sit down and write a review when I don't really want to. I mean I don't have to do it, because it's not like I have a deadline, but I don't like to let movies pile up to where I have to review seven at a time or something, that would be considerably worse. I literally have no idea where that came from, but that's about enough for now. I don't have much to say about this film as it relates to actually going into much detail, but I thought this was a perfectly good, albeit old-school, little movie. And I don't mean that in a derogatory manner, it's just the way it is. But that old-fashioned approach definitely helped add more authenticity to this. It's obviously not a film from the 50s, as if you couldn't tell, but it's about as close as it's gonna get to, as it relates to style and performance, as you're gonna get without travelling back in time to that era. But, if i'm being honest, I felt that this movie should have been more than good, especially considering the fact that it's based on an incredible real-life story. The film is certainly good and Bernie and his crew's journey to save the crew of the oil tanker that ripped in two led to some pretty intense moments, but the movie never really kicks it up to a higher level. I don't wanna say that I didn't care for the characters, but there's no real depth to any of them. And there's no problem with that, since the story is all about the rescue. But, at the same time, there's no real emotional attachment to any of them. It's not like you'd be indifferent to their deaths, but it wouldn't really hit you either. And I think that that is what the movie was missing. Of course, I'm not even close to suggesting that this was a bad movie, but it was just missing an element that would have made it great. But, and I say this often with movies based on real-life stories, this would have made an even better documentary, if you could have gotten interviews with the real people. Of course, maybe there's one out there and I just haven't heard of it. But I think you would've gotten a lot of insight. Though the movie does do a great job at making the journey to the oil tanker as horrifying as humanly possible. I've never been a fan of the sea as it is and this movie sort of reinforces that dislike. The acting is strong, no complaints there. And the film offers enough thrills to counteract the fact that the story doesn't go as in depth as it probably could have. Though, again, it probably wasn't intended to be anything more than just a basic 'action/adventure' with an incredible real-life story attached to it. This is a good movie, just don't go in expecting anything more than that.
Verified