Review of All Is Lost (2013) by Ben L — 09 Jul 2014

This will be a shorter review than I usually offer up because there isn't a whole lot of film here. I don't mean that as something derogatory against the film, it's just that the whole concept is very basic. The plot is simple, a man on a solo sailing trip runs into a giant metal shipping container. This isn't a spoiler, it happens right at the beginning of the film. The story is about the 8 days he spends trying to survive on the open sea with no way of contacting the outside world. The look of the sea is gorgeous. I love the establishing shots from under the sea which show aquatic life thriving as his life fades away. There is very little left to tell about the plot, because it is all so logical. Things start out kind of bad, but he is able to deal with the situation. Then things slowly get worse. It is strange how you can feel so comforted as a viewer, as though things are under control, and then suddenly you recognize this is a situation he will not be capable of fixing. As he starts to lose hope so do we. For such a straightforward story it is very well-crafted.

There is only one actor in All Is Lost. Redford is completely alone, which is vital to the story, but makes for a very quiet film. I think Redford only says about 12 words (with the exception of a letter he reads aloud as the film opens.) The makeup done on Redford is remarkable. You can see him getting more emaciated and you can see the damage his skin starts to suffer from prolonged exposure to the sun. What I found myself missing was more emotion from Redford. We understand at the beginning of the film that he is a very capable sailor, and is able to take care of a lot of the dire situations. Yet when things start to fall apart and he starts to lose control I expected a less controlled reaction. There was hardly any emotion from his character, even in the most extreme moments of despair I don't feel any genuine feeling in the words. I was totally wowed by the physically taxing nature of the role, so it's not like Redford was terrible. I just expected to see that physical exhaustion playing into his emotional reactions. All Is Lost is not a bad film, but sadly it has been done before. To be honest it really suffers from the fact that it came out the same year as Sandra Bullock was doing a similar survival story in space, and Tom Hanks was making a much more emotional shot at survival on the high sea. This is a good film, but just doesn't measure up to others in the same genre.