The Perfect Storm «««½
PG-13, 129m. 2000
Cast & Credits: George Clooney (Captain Billy Tyne), Mark Wahlberg (Bobby Shatford), Mary Elizabeth Mastrontonio (Linda Greenlaw), John C. Reilly (Murph), William Fichtner (Sully), Karen Allen (Alfred Pierre), Diane Lane (Christina Cotter), John Hawkes (Bugsy), Cherry Jones (Edie Bailey), Bob Gunton (Alexander McAnnally III), Christopher McDonald (Todd Gross), Michael Ironside (Bob Brown), Rusty Schwimmer (Irene ‘Big Red’ Johnson). Screenplay by William D. Wittliff based on the book by Sebastian Junger. Directed by Wolfgang Petersen.
If Irwin Allen, producer and director of such all-star disaster epics of the 1970s that included The Poseidon Adventure (1972), The Towering Inferno (1974), Earthquake (1974) and The Swarm (1978) were alive today, he’d probably make a movie like The Perfect Storm. The film has all the elements reminiscent of his earlier catastrophic pictures.
The film has got such repetitive dialogue where just about every character in the movie says a line having to do with fish. Examples would be “I know where the fish are”, “I like to fish”, “Just bring me the fish” and the line said with the most emotion, “My man is out there risking his life for a bunch of fish.”
The Perfect Storm also has its share of stubborn, shortsighted characters who refuse to accept fate or failure like the ones from Allen’s earlier movies like Captain Billy Tyne (George Clooney) of the ill-fated fishing troller, Andrea Gail. Tyne, a down-on-his-luck sea fisherman, is willing to risk the lives of his crew to retrieve a boatload of fish traveling to The Flemish Cap which a aged drunken sailor at a local bar warns has “lots of storms and lots of fish.”
Then there is the sailboat captain (Bob Gunton) who repeatedly tells his two passengers (Karen Allen and Cherry Jones) “This is my boat” and refuses to call for help even after his ship has capsized twice in a swirling tempest.
Like The Towering Inferno and The Poseidon Adventure which boasted Oscar nominated performances from Fred Astaire and Shelly Winters, The Perfect Storm’s best performance comes from Diane Lane (Streets of Fire – 1984) as a divorced recovering alcoholic hoping for a long term relationship with one of Tyne’s crew (Mark Wahlberg).
There is even a villain who in this case, is not so much “the Monster” which Tyne’s friendly competition, Captain Linda Greenlaw (Mary Elizabeth Mastrontonio), calls when three major storm fronts collide together in the fall of 1991 off the coast of Maryland to become Hurricane Grace.
The villain is the money hungry boss of Glouscester’s fishing fleet played by Michael Ironside (Total Recall - 1990). He’s not so much concerned for the welfare of the crews or the broken down equipment of his boats as he is interested in how much meat is brought back from every run.
With all these elements at hand, a movie like The Perfect Storm shouldn’t work but I found that miraculously, it does. The film is not so much about the characters as it is about the situation they face. It’s about survival.
The film is based on author Sebastian Junger’s 1997 best seller that has been the subject of such hour-long news segments as 20/20. The movie, much like the book, not only tells the story of the Andrea Gail and her six man crew lost at sea but the attempted rescue made by the coast guard as they battle 40 foot waves, most of which actually touch the landing gears of the helicopters. At one point, an air force jet tries to refuel a chopper in mid-air during 150 mile per hour winds but it’s obvious they can’t pull it off (and I doubt it can be done in real life).
Director Wolfgang Petersen (Air Force One - 1997) who made me feel like I was suffering from claustrophobia watching his German U-Boat epic, Das Boot (1981), made me wonder if what these trained men do is not just bravery but plain suicide.
Since the book was written after the Andrea Gail’s crew perished Junger had to rely on interviews from other fishermen who’ve lived through such raging tempests to get an idea of what the sailors supposedly went through. As a result, William D. Witliff’s screenplay that includes a number of scenes aboard the boat during the fishing expedition and the storm can only be assumed.
Like James Cameron’s Titanic (1997) which made me hope the luxury liner would avert disaster with an iceberg, The Perfect Storm made me hope, despite what I already knew from news accounts, that this underpaid, overworked crew would make it through the storm.
I felt like those crewmembers played by John C. Reilly, William Fichtner, John Hawkes and Allen Payne did when Tyne says they would have to ride out the storm. They felt defeated. I felt like I had just been punched in the stomach.
©6/30/00
PG-13, 129m. 2000
Cast & Credits: George Clooney (Captain Billy Tyne), Mark Wahlberg (Bobby Shatford), Mary Elizabeth Mastrontonio (Linda Greenlaw), John C. Reilly (Murph), William Fichtner (Sully), Karen Allen (Alfred Pierre), Diane Lane (Christina Cotter), John Hawkes (Bugsy), Cherry Jones (Edie Bailey), Bob Gunton (Alexander McAnnally III), Christopher McDonald (Todd Gross), Michael Ironside (Bob Brown), Rusty Schwimmer (Irene ‘Big Red’ Johnson). Screenplay by William D. Wittliff based on the book by Sebastian Junger. Directed by Wolfgang Petersen.
The film has got such repetitive dialogue where just about every character in the movie says a line having to do with fish. Examples would be “I know where the fish are”, “I like to fish”, “Just bring me the fish” and the line said with the most emotion, “My man is out there risking his life for a bunch of fish.”
The Perfect Storm also has its share of stubborn, shortsighted characters who refuse to accept fate or failure like the ones from Allen’s earlier movies like Captain Billy Tyne (George Clooney) of the ill-fated fishing troller, Andrea Gail. Tyne, a down-on-his-luck sea fisherman, is willing to risk the lives of his crew to retrieve a boatload of fish traveling to The Flemish Cap which a aged drunken sailor at a local bar warns has “lots of storms and lots of fish.”
Then there is the sailboat captain (Bob Gunton) who repeatedly tells his two passengers (Karen Allen and Cherry Jones) “This is my boat” and refuses to call for help even after his ship has capsized twice in a swirling tempest.
Like The Towering Inferno and The Poseidon Adventure which boasted Oscar nominated performances from Fred Astaire and Shelly Winters, The Perfect Storm’s best performance comes from Diane Lane (Streets of Fire – 1984) as a divorced recovering alcoholic hoping for a long term relationship with one of Tyne’s crew (Mark Wahlberg).
There is even a villain who in this case, is not so much “the Monster” which Tyne’s friendly competition, Captain Linda Greenlaw (Mary Elizabeth Mastrontonio), calls when three major storm fronts collide together in the fall of 1991 off the coast of Maryland to become Hurricane Grace.
The villain is the money hungry boss of Glouscester’s fishing fleet played by Michael Ironside (Total Recall - 1990). He’s not so much concerned for the welfare of the crews or the broken down equipment of his boats as he is interested in how much meat is brought back from every run.
With all these elements at hand, a movie like The Perfect Storm shouldn’t work but I found that miraculously, it does. The film is not so much about the characters as it is about the situation they face. It’s about survival.
The film is based on author Sebastian Junger’s 1997 best seller that has been the subject of such hour-long news segments as 20/20. The movie, much like the book, not only tells the story of the Andrea Gail and her six man crew lost at sea but the attempted rescue made by the coast guard as they battle 40 foot waves, most of which actually touch the landing gears of the helicopters. At one point, an air force jet tries to refuel a chopper in mid-air during 150 mile per hour winds but it’s obvious they can’t pull it off (and I doubt it can be done in real life).
Director Wolfgang Petersen (Air Force One - 1997) who made me feel like I was suffering from claustrophobia watching his German U-Boat epic, Das Boot (1981), made me wonder if what these trained men do is not just bravery but plain suicide.
Since the book was written after the Andrea Gail’s crew perished Junger had to rely on interviews from other fishermen who’ve lived through such raging tempests to get an idea of what the sailors supposedly went through. As a result, William D. Witliff’s screenplay that includes a number of scenes aboard the boat during the fishing expedition and the storm can only be assumed.
Like James Cameron’s Titanic (1997) which made me hope the luxury liner would avert disaster with an iceberg, The Perfect Storm made me hope, despite what I already knew from news accounts, that this underpaid, overworked crew would make it through the storm.
I felt like those crewmembers played by John C. Reilly, William Fichtner, John Hawkes and Allen Payne did when Tyne says they would have to ride out the storm. They felt defeated. I felt like I had just been punched in the stomach.
©6/30/00
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