As we've embarked on the film 'dead season', we have gotten to a week that certainly has promise--"Miss Peregrine's School for Peculiar Children" and now in the offing we have "Deepwater Horizon", both in the same week. Docudramas, or films based on a true story are really getting to be chic these days what with "Sully", "Lone Survivor", "Snowden", even with "Patriots Day" releasing in 1-2017. They certainly have a lot to say, and this film is no exception. This docudrama is about the Deepwater Horizon disaster, the April 20, 2010 oil rig explosion in the Gulf of Mexico 41 miles off the coast of Louisiana that resulted in the largest offshore oil spill (210 million gallons) in U.S. history. The film depicts the intense challenges that Mike Williams (Mark Wahlberg) and the rest of the crew including Jimmy Harrell (Kurt Russell) Andrea Fleytas (Gina Rodriguez), Vidrine (John Malkovich), Caleb Holloway (Dylan O'Brien), Jason Anderson (Ethan Suplee) and others faced as they fought for survival. Being the mammoth size the rig was, many of the crew had no idea there was even a problem. It was only after a series of leakages and explosions that it became crystal clear that this was a mayday situation.
This was intensely and grittily directed by Peter Berg ("Very Bad Things" '98, "The Rundown" '03, "Friday Night Lights" '04, "The Kingdom" '07, "Hancock" '08, "Virtuality" (TV movie) '09, "Battleship" '12, "Bloodline" (TV movie) '13, "Lone Survivor" '13) plus TV. This filmmaker, being an actor himself, knows how to get his actors to do what they do, especially in difficult situations. If you like his directing and you're a Wahlberg fan, "Patriots Day" with Wahlberg and directed by Berg is in post production now, and is looking at a January 2017 release. It was as intensely written by Matthew Michael Carnahan and Matthew Sand based on a screen story by Sand which is based on an article by David Rohde and Stephanie Saul. Even though Carnahan has the brunt of the writing experience, the screen story was based on Sand's idea which he came up with from the article it was based. It was a slickly, taught, cohesive screenplay without getting into all the politics that this incident brought out. This is not why this was made. It was to bring out the different heroes that survived this debacle and, in the process, saved many others. Wahlberg and Malkovich gave stunning performances as the characters they portrayed. And last but certainly not least, the visual effects predominantly created by ILM (Industrial, Light & Magic) were absolutely seamless, not to mention the sound effects predominantly designed by Wylie Stateman were equally amazing. These left my mouth drop more than once.
Look, if you have any plans on seeing this film, make sure you watch it on the large screen-- I even saw it in its IMAX format which gave you feeling that you were right there on the oil rig. Lesson learned? We must believe that we are not in charge of nature and if we do not respect nature, it will come back and bite you in the ass.
Out of 4 Stars: 4 Rated: PG-13 107mins.
I worked for several years on an offshore oil rig so this movie hit near to home. While certain aspects of the life out there were "hollywoodized" the movie definitely captured the feeling of total dependence on the equipment and people that one has when working in this type of environment. There were certainly, shall I say creative exaggerations but all and all the director and cast painted a picture of how terrifying this type of scenario would be for a offshore crew. When I worked in the oil field in the 70's and 80's this type of thing would have been hard to imagine since the operators of the rig had the final say on safety issues but I guess the big bucks now have more power and can call the shots even if they are wrong. Anyway, I enjoyed the movie and some of the scenes were quite gripping.
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