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IN THE HEART OF THE SEA
[2015, USA - English]
IN THE HEART OF THE SEA
[2015, USA - English]
In 1995, Ron Howard successfully depicted the aborted 1970 Apollo 13 lunar mission, dramatizing the journey of astronauts in the perilous abyss of space. Twenty years later the Oscar-winning director attempts to bring Nathaniel Philbrick’s non-fiction bestseller to the big screens, chronicling the desperate journey of a crippled whaling ship at sea, grueling with a giant sperm whale, in his latest adventure thriller-drama In The Heart Of The Sea.
The story begins with Herman Melville (Ben Wishaw) visiting ageing sailor Thomas Nickerson (Brendan Gleeson) as part of the research for his novel, to recount the harrowing and monumental event in Nickerson’s past, as the last survivor of the large ship Essex that sank 30 years ago, rumored to have been brought to wreck by a vengeful whale. So through Nickerson’s reluctant flashbacks, we are brought back to 1820 Nantucket, where Captain George Holland (Benjamin Walker) headbutts with his First Mate Owen Chase (Chris Hemsworth) as they sail their way into the Atlantic in hope to return as rich whale oil. Nickerson is just a fourteen year old cabin boy then (portrayed by Tom Holland). Chase is an able and experienced whaler while Holland has much to prove as he inherited his authority through his patrician family connections. As we will learn, the relationship between the two clashing leaders becomes the singular moment that delves a bit more into the characters, where both interestingly will be made neither obvious hero nor villain despite evident initial impressions. Once the sail detours deeper into the Pacific instead in search of a mythical pod of whales, the film starts to sink into a rather long journey without really achieving the required buffet it ambitiously sets out to. Whilst cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle (Slumdog Millionaire 2008) paints us an epic of lush visuals, In The Heart somehow fails in several pivotal points of the film especially when we are brought onto the chaotic deck amidst the choppy waterlogged action sequences during the whale attacks. We can hardly see who’s doing what!
As the film progresses further where the men are shipwrecked, left stranded floating through the Pacific on life boats, whilst continuously hounded by the vengeful sperm whale, Howard does not offer much further development of the characters, making it hard for us to really care for their survival. Many critics were also pinning the film down for the lack of impact comparing it to Jaws, and to me it has a lot to do with the fact that we were never really treated with a holistic view of the gargantuan sea monster. We get glimpses of parts of the creature, its colossal tail whipping the ship into pieces, its daggering eye when it comes face to face with Chase, but it is never revealed entirely, resulting in a “Moby Dick” that suffers a physicality moment that jolts and mesmerizes audience altogether.
The latter part of the plot unfortunately focuses a hefty lot on the men’s survival being shipwrecked with very limited supplies. I quote "unfortunate" as it is neither the colourful and multi-layered journey in Life of Pi (Ang Li, 2012), nor the inspiring steel-perseverance of Unbroken (Angelina Jolie, 2014). Coupled with Hemsworth's confusing interchanging accents and rather lazy screenwriting by Charles Leavitt (Blood Diamond 2006), the film fails to deliver enough for audience to care much about the characters' development, relationships or survival. The irony of Leavitt's writing process (which actually took place ten years ago) was that whilst attempting to stay as accurate as possible, one of the main focal points he wanted to stress in the story was the hardships of these whalers back then, which he did manage, including depicting the laborious moments endured on deck and not shying away from the cold brutality of the whaling process. Beyond that, he has somehow failed in many levels to make us connect with any of the characters, even Hemsworth. All in all a visual treat, a piece of entertainment, but hardly an epic you would talk about in years to come, given its gigantic cost to make and relevance in revisiting the roots of a tale that became one of the defining texts of American literature, Moby-Dick.
Rating: B-
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