Review of In the Heart of the Sea (2015) by Kyle T — 12 Jan 2016

With the exception of a few films like A Beautiful Mind, Ron Howard seems to really enjoy skipping over heavy exposition and jumping right into the action with a lot of his films. This can be both to a film's benefit and its demise. When you choose to jump right into the action, instead of taking the time to help us learn about the characters' backstories and connect with them, you're forced into the difficult task of relying on characters' actions and words to create character development. While this often prevents a film from being boring, it also can make it difficult for audiences to connect with characters and care about them. It worked great in Rush, Howard's previous film with star Chris Hemsworth. In his latest film, In The Heart of the Sea, it works some of the time, but not always.

For instance, Cillian Murphy has several good scenes that hint at an alcoholic past but never come out and say it. His character gets sick along the journey and we the audience are supposed to feel for him. The only reason this works is because Murphy is such a good actor that he can grasp the audience in just a few brief moments. It works for him, but it doesn't work for all the actors in the film.

Our leads, Chris Hemsworth, Benjamin Walker and Tom Holland (our new Spider-man) all deliver great performances with what they have to work with. Like I said, there isn't a lot of actual character development going on-but these actors are so good it is easy to connect with them anyway. Brendan Gleeson, Michelle Fairly and Ben Whishaw (as Herman Melville) all perform well in a story-framing arc that features a survivor of the disaster spilling his story to Moby Dick author Herman Melville. The problem here is that I'm not sure how much I cared for this framing device. At times it worked perfectly and added weight to the story. Other times it was like "What? We're cutting to these people now, really?!".

Where ITHOTS shines is in its action and visuals. This is a stunning film. A nomination for best cinematography would seem like a no-brainer, but this is a competitive year for that category. I saw the film in 2D and felt like I was part of the action on screen, I imagine the 3D version would have made me downright sea-sick. There are a few what I like to call "Michael Bay shots" that annoyed me, but thankfully they are few and far between. Anyone who's watched a Transformers movie knows what I'm referring to.

There are graphic scenes about the details of whaling (ie we see whales killed, skinned and oil pulled from them), that may bother some viewers but I appreciated how real these scenes looked. This brings to mind the production value as a whole which was really top notch. The ships are gorgeous, and the attention to detail in everything from scenery to costume design is quite impressive.

When ITHOTS works it works very very well. Some of these scenes are some of the best film-making, at least from a technical standpoint, I've seen all year. When the film doesn't work it is easily forgiven as the experience as a whole is very enjoyable. I would recommend anyone seeking a great action adventure film watch it on the big screen where it was meant to be seen. This is simply one of those films that will not play as well at home as it does in the theater.

8/10.