Movie Review—All Is Lost

My dad always had a low opinion of amusement park rides. He is fond of saying things like, "Why would I pay to ride around on a roller coaster when I can go out on the ocean and do it for real?" I've been out on the ocean on pretty rough days—not as rough as some of the days he's seen, but rough enough to get what he's talking about. With a roller coaster, the thrills are manufactured, and there's the notion that as frightening as they might be, they're designed to thrill and not hurt. The ocean doesn't have that psychological safety net. It doesn't want to kill you or save you or hurt you. It just is what it is, and when humans get in its path, they must respect it or they will suffer. And even respect isn't always enough.

All Is Lost gets this idea across better than any movie I've seen. This movie is already something of a miracle and a wonder, in that it's got barely any dialogue in it, because it's only got one actor in the entire thing. The movie starts with Robert Redford's character waking on his sailboat somewhere in the Indian Ocean with water rushing into his cabin–his boat struck a container that fell off a ship, and now there's a hole at the waterline. The captain doesn't panic or freak out—he knows that won't solve the problem. He just goes to work, doing his best to fix the situation. A situation that spirals out of control despite the fact that he increasingly does every thing he can do to survive.

Because the ocean doesn't care if you survive or not.

Believe it or not... it gets worse.

All Is Lost ...

• ... brought back memories of the smell of fiberglass resin.
• ... is PG-13 pretty much entirely for one of the most despair-fueled uses of the f-bomb I've seen.
• ... confirms my suspicions of how harrowing it would be to be in a storm in a sailboat where the swells are bigger than your boat.
• ... is one of the best movies of 2013.

Grade: A+

Movie Review—Kon-Tiki

I've felt that the story of the Kon-Tiki would make a great movie for a long time. And while this movie was not great... it was still pretty good. The story of Thor Heyerdal and the journey he and his crew made across the Pacific Ocean is pretty awesome, one fraught with peril and adventure and beauty. It's not one that needs to be "amped up," and had this been a full-on Hollywood-style production, I'm sure it would have had gunfights and car chases.

It wasn't a Hollywood-style production, but the scenes I'd been most interested in seeing were either "actioned up" or cut altogether, and some scenes that didn't exist at all were put in there just to liven up the pace. That, and some shots of sharks and stuff not really behaving the way sharks behave were a bit unfortunate.

Still a well-made and entertaining movie. Just didn't manage to meet the expectations I'd built up for the movie over the past, oh, three decades or so. I'm not sure anything could, though.

Awww! Poor little guy got left on the cutting room floor! Just because he's ugly!

Kon-Tiki is...

• ... missing the scene where the snake mackerel jumps in bed with one of the crew.
• ... has the scene with the whale shark (it kinda HAD to) but it was over way too quickly.
• ... did an incredible job with realizing the world; great cinematography and for the most part great special effects.
• ... made me want to re-read Thor's book to remind myself of which parts the movie made up and which parts really happened.
• ... didn't spend long enough time at sea.
• ... has a shot that goes from the surface of the ocean, up into orbit around the earth, then back down to the sea that is really rather awesome.

Grade: B+