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Simply Perfect

A Disappointing Continuation

It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

One of the film's great tricks is that, for a time, you think it will go down a rabbit hole of unrealistic glorification.

A disaster movie about a disaster that really happened. In his film "Deepwater Horizon", director Peter Berg adopts a documentary approach and takes his time getting to the big bang and the movie is all the better for it. This is a movie that never exploits either its subject or its characters while still ticking all the necessary boxes and benefits considerably from a first-rate cast, (Mark Wahlberg, Kurt Russell, a terrific John Malkovitch, Kate Hudson etc), all at the top of their game; no mean feat when the real star of the picture is an exploding oil rig, (special effects, cinematography, editing, sound recording are all top notch). As disaster movies go, this is highly effective and in the end, very moving.

How does a disaster like Deepwater Horizon happen? This movie won't help you get that, but it might prompt you to look it up on Wikipedia and give you a greater appreciation of the risks in drilling that oil that runs your car. I am not a big action-movie fan but I found this movie interesting. One does care about the character played well by Mark Wahlberg and his reunion with his too-pretty-to-be-believed family, complete with dinosaur tooth, is indeed moving. I also liked the performance of Kurt Russell, who has aged since I saw him last in a film, but remains a very good-looking man. He creates an interesting persona of a safety professional whose vigilance extends beyond his job description. "Did you floss today," he asks a character, and how right he is to inquire!Many of the other characters in the movie come across as caricatures, including John Malkovich as a BP bigwig with an exaggerated Louisiana drawl. (The ending credits tell us that he was indicted and acquitted of manslaughter...a few more lines on this point would have been greatly appreciated. But, as elsewhere in this film, there's always Wikipedia.) Unsurprisingly, the special effects here are impressive. Fire in all of its forms is a terrifying thing and the horror is brought to life here. I'm glad that the movie named and showed pictures of the 11 crew members who perished in the conflagration. According to Wikipedia, their bodies were never recovered. I wish this film had provided additional credits on what, if anything, has been learned, so that the biggest oil-industry disaster of all time won't be exceeded in the future.

The film makers wisely focus their main effort on portraying the very real dangers involved in the offshore E&P business (even down to bird strikes that can play havoc with equipment) and how things can so easily go wrong, risking the lives of the people at the front end. Unfortunately, they did fall into the trap of following the US business and government narrative at the time, throwing all the blame onto a foreign oil company that was making serious inroads into 'their' business. While not wishing to excuse BP from their significant responsibility, subsequent investigations have shown culpability in the series of errors that led to the disaster to be shared among a number of companies involved, most of them American. Nevertheless, since the film mainly follows the technical complexity of the operations taking place and reactions under the severest stress, it is an action movie that stands as an effective tribute to those 11 men who died so tragically, as well as the heroism and professional competence of many of those who survived. My main spoiler is to point out that the Wahlberg character, while representing a specific individual, actually incorporated several individuals on the platform and is shown doing numerous things that were actually done by others. Why can't Hollywood just recognise the heroism in most people, working together as a team, instead of concentrating it into a single superhero? This is supposed to be a 'real-world' event, after all!

This is a dramatization of the events surrounding the explosion and BP spill of the Deepwater Horizon floating platform located 41 miles off the coast of Louisiana. The film centers around Mike Williams (Mark Wahlberg) the Chief Electronics Technician (according to his hard hat but he was an engineer) of the crew and to a lesser extended through Andrea Fleytas (Gina Rodriguez) an operator. The operation of the drilling is explained early in the film by Mike's daughter using a coke can and honey for a school project. Ominously the coke sprays out the top.We see Mike struggle to maintain a safe ship against the pressure of schedule and profits as they drill "the well from hell." He says, "Every time I peel off a band-aid I find three or four more. " He butts head with John Malkovich who had the honor of playing BP engineer and representative Don Vidrine, the film's bad guy. He helps explains things to Don by comparing safety to noodling.The special effects were pretty intense. Like so many major accidents, people want to deny they are happening until too late. The irony is that this unsafe rig was getting a safety award for being BP's safest rig. I shudder to think.In the end, the film has a brief tribute to those who lost their lives for oil and profits.Guide: 1 F-word. No sex or nudity.