Starring
Mark Wahlberg, Kurt Russell, John Malkovich, Gina Rodriguez, Dylan
O'Brien, Kate Hudson, Ethan Suplee. Directed by Peter Berg. (2016,
107 min).
As
far back as I can remember, disaster movies have been my favorite
genre. Good ones, bad ones, so-bad-they're-good ones...there's
something about mass destruction I've always found wonderfully
entertaining. Their heyday was in the 1970s, when such creative
cataclysms as Airport and The Poseidon Adventure laid down the blueprint for a slew of others to follow, including what's generally
considered the epoch of the genre, The Towering Inferno.
For a brief time, that blueprint was foolproof...gather some marquee
names, throw them in a burning skyscraper/sinking ship/quake-ravaged
town, add some subplots & big-ass special effects and you had a
license to print money. Regarding the characters, you could almost
always count on seeing the selfless & down-to-Earth hero, the
woman who loves him, the "cute" child who needs rescuing, a pop
star who shows up to croon an Oscar-baiting love song, the estranged
couple who fall in love all over again just before one of them dies,
the gruff-but-kindly hardass, the “expert” who designed whatever
vehicle or structure that's now killing people. I could go on, but
would be remiss if I didn't give a shout-out to one more crucial
character: the “company man” whose greed and carelessness is usually the catalyst for the disaster in the first place. He exists to
contradict the hero's common sense at every turn, then when the shit
does hit the fan, he gets a heaping helping of karmic retribution.
These
films were definitely products of their time, and while no one really makes
them like that anymore, disaster movies never actually went away.
The genre even made something of a comeback in the 90s under the guise of
action movies (Twister), science-fiction (Deep Impact), epic drama
(Titanic) or true stories (Apollo 13). The formula was a bit
different, but as long as people died and shit got blown up, all was
still right with the world.
Deepwater
Horizon is based on a true story as well – the Gulf of Mexico oil
rig explosion in 2010 - but adheres to that 70s' Hollywood disaster
formula more faithfully than recent films like The Finest
Hours and Sully (though the latter is Clint Eastwood's best movie in years). We have the down-to-Earth hero (Mark Wahlberg), his
loving wife (Kate Hudson, in a rather thankless role), the gruff
hardass and expert roll into one (Kurt Russell).
 |
| Mr. Wahlberg is not feeling Good Vibrations right now. |
It also features
a doozy of a company man in form of John Malkovich, chewing the
scenery and having a whale of a time as sleazy BP executive Donald
Vidrine. He refuses to allow Mike (Wahlberg) and Mr. Jimmy (Russell)
to test the stability of the drilling foundation on the sea floor because falling further behind schedule would be costly. Of course, he lives to
regret that decision when the rig explodes and burns out of control,
killing some people and trapping dozens of others. Much of the second
half of the film has Mike selflessly trying to save co-workers from burning alive while
awaiting rescue.
Aside
from Mike, Mr. Jimmy and Vidrine, none of the other characters are
particularly memorable unless they're sacrificing their lives to save
others, but the spectacular mayhem more-than makes-up for that. The
film takes some time to get going – mostly to explain all the
tech-talk and establish Vidrine as a despicable ass. But when
disaster finally strikes, Deepwater Horizon is vivid, chilling,
intense and completely convincing. We never feel like we're watching
these actors in front of a green screen. While the rig's inner workings
and causes of the explosion are complicated, the
screenplay always makes certain those of us who've never set foot on
a drilling platform clearly understand everything. Best of all, even though it's based on true events, the overall plotline is straight out of a good old fashioned, 70's-era disaster epic. Woo Hoo!
Deepwater
Horizon isn't quite the emotional triumph it clearly wants to be, and you probably won't give it
a ton of thought afterwards (except maybe to Google whether or not
some of those BP bastards got what they deserved). But the
performances are good and the experience of being stuck on this
burning rig as it topples around us is as intense and real as any destructive drama you'd care to name. It may not have a sappy song interlude, obnoxious kids or silly subplots (unless you count Mike's quest for a dinosaur bone to give his kid), but old school disaster fans will find a lot to love. Put it in and play it loud, folks.
EXTRA
KIBBLES:
“BEYOND
THE HORIZON” - A lengthy, five-part documentary featuring the
primary cast.
FEATURETTES:
“The Fury of the Rig”; “Deepwater Surveillance”; “Work Like
an American”; “Captain of the Rig” (this feature focuses on
director Peter Berg).
DVD
& DIGITAL COPIES
KITTY CONSENSUS:
PURR-R-R...LIKE A GOOD SCRATCH BEHIND THE EARS
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