In the Heart of the Sea

For F*** Magazine

IN THE HEART OF THE SEA

Cast : Chris Hemsworth, Benjamin Walker, Tom Holland, Cillian Murphy, Ben Whishaw, Brendan Gleeson, Michelle Fairley
Genre : Action/Adventure/Drama
Run Time : 121 mins
Opens : 3 December 2015
Rating : PG13 (Some Disturbing Scenes)

Pull up a chair, because director Ron Howard’s got a whale of a tale to tell you lads, a whale of a tale or two. Author Herman Melville (Whishaw) travels to Nantucket Island, Massachusetts to interview innkeeper Thomas Nickerson (Gleeson), in order to research the novel Moby-Dick. At age 14, Nickerson (Holland) was a cabin boy aboard the whaleship Essex, sailing with Captain George Pollard, Jr. (Walker), First Mate Owen Chase (Hemsworth) and Second Mate Matthew Joy (Murphy). It is the year 1820 and whale blubber is a valuable commodity for its use as fuel. While off the South American coast, the Essex is rammed by a bull sperm whale and sinks, stranding its crew at sea. Nickerson recounts the harrowing events to Melville, confronting dark memories of starvation, madness and survival, during which the crew drew lots to determine who would be killed and eaten for the others to live.

            In the Heart of the Sea is based on Nathaniel Philbrick’s 2000 non-fiction book of the same name. The film was originally set for release in March this year, but was pushed back to December presumably for awards season consideration. The true story seems like it has all the makings of a gripping film, but while the end result is competently executed, it fails to be truly thrilling or moving. By now, audiences know what to expect from a survival at sea drama – the elements will be braved, there will be desperate situations, the crew will be at each other’s throats, the survivors will have to band together to stay alive and so on. In the Heart of the Sea hopes to offer something different in the form of the whale, but there is very little of the film in which the crew of the Essex actually face off against their Cetecean nemesis.

            This is a film about extremes that often plays it very safe, even with the depiction of cannibalism. There are times when In the Heart of the Sea comes across like it’s trying to emulate a prestigious British costume drama epic and while effort is made to capture the whaleship setting and time period, the film never quite attains the desired level of authenticity. Because of the way the framing device is set up, with the middle-aged Nickerson reluctantly telling Melville about the events he braved in his youth aboard the Essex, there is a significant amount of exposition. It feels like we have to wade through the history to get to the exciting bits, as opposed to being actually invested in these characters and caring about what happens to them.

            The cast take the material very seriously and while this is not a poorly acted film, there isn’t quite enough personality to each of the historical figures. There is conflict between Captain George Pollard, Jr. and First Mate Owen Chase, because Chase was promised the captaincy but Pollard got the position through his family connections. The two men eventually come to an understanding, but given the circumstances, their interaction should be more riveting than this. Hemsworth, reuniting with his Rush director, famously went on a diet of 500 calories a day to portray the starving sailor. Bidding farewell to all that muscle must be like sending a firstborn child off to college. Hemsworth’s Chase is the hero who looks out for his men, a very straight-forward role. Walker is often quite bland opposite him and even though he’s playing the captain, there are moments when this reviewer almost forgot he existed.

            Murphy’s usual magnetism and subtle unpredictability are all but absent from his turn as Second Mate Matthew Joy, and given how the story is told from Nickerson’s point of view, we expected Holland to be given more emotional beats to play. The sequence in which the Essex goes down in flames after it is struck by the enraged whale is excitingly staged, but most of the drama is predictable and the film stops short of being truly immersive. There are also scenes depicting baby whales in the pod, and one can’t help but side with the whales at times. Sure, the whalers are doing their job and we don’t mean to get all Greenpeace, but at the end of the day, this is a movie in which our heroes are killing animals that wouldn’t bother them if they didn’t get all up in their business. This reviewer never really felt like he was stranded alongside the crew of the Essex and the detachedness is what ultimately lets In the Heart of the Sea down.

Summary: What should be an epic adventure is mostly dull and doesn’t offer anything drastically different from other survival at sea films.

RATING: 2.5 out of 5 Stars

Jedd Jong 

How I Live Now

For F*** Magazine

HOW I LIVE NOW 

Director: Kevin Macdonald
Cast: Saoirse Ronan, George MacKay, Tom Holland, Anna Chancellor, Harley Bird, Corey Johnson
Genre: Action, Drama, Thriller
Run Time: 101 mins
Opens: M18 (Sexual Scene)
Rating: 23 January 2014

The coming of age movie: it’s a genre that won’t go out of style. Anyone from any generation can relate to the concept of being post-pubescent, casting aside the carefree whims of childhood and “finding oneself”; wrestling with newfound thoughts and emotions, many attributable to the onset of hormones. Based on Meg Rosoff’s acclaimed young-adult novel of the same name, How I Live Now presents a coming-of-age tale of a different stripe, unfolding against the backdrop of a modern-day world war.

Elizabeth (Ronan) – or Daisy, as she insists on being called – is a morose, bratty New York teenager sent by her father to spend the summer in the English countryside. Playing host to Daisy is her Aunt Penn (Chancellor), sister of Daisy’s late mother. An academic expert on extremism and incredibly busy given the tense political climate around the world, Aunt Penn is called away on official business. So, Daisy is left with her cousins Isaac (Holland), Eddie (MacKay) and Piper (Bird). Though frosty and unwilling to participate at first, Daisy eventually settles into life away from the city. She also enters into a taboo romantic relationship with Eddie, but their blossoming romance is violently interrupted by the reality of an enemy occupation of the United Kingdom and the young lovers are torn apart. Daisy goes on the run with Piper, whom she has to care for, facing a variety of threats in the hopes of being eventually reunited with Eddie.



Young-adult novel adaptations have become attractive prospects to studio execs but are more often than not risky endeavours too. In 2013, The Mortal Instruments: City Of Bones and Beautiful Creatures were critical and commercial duds. How I Live Now is atypical among such movies, the British production bearing an arthouse/indie flavour. The book it’s based on is not the first in a series of seven; there’s just one book. Lovingly photographed by cinematographer Franz Lustig, this is far from a wannabe Twilight or Hunger Games, though it has been mis-categorised as such. But this is not to say that it stands head and shoulders above its peers as some kind of picture of sophistication.

Director Kevin Macdonald, of The Last King of Scotland and State of Play fame, does a masterful job of quietly hinting at the larger world in which this intimate story takes place. When Daisy arrives at the airport, we glimpse the increased presence of uniformed soldiers and the stepped-up security measures. Chinook helicopters fly past in the background. The threat remains unnamed and unspecified, a looming, faceless terror. Macdonald draws on his own childhood summers spent in the countryside for his portrait of a carefree idyll bathed in soft sunlight, so when the movie enters “wartime mode”, the transition is effectively jarring.



However, one gets the feeling that a far more interesting story could have been told given this rich, thought-provoking backdrop. The film meanders and ambles, time spent with the main characters seeming more like time wasted than anything else. Daisy is sulky, pouty and insufferable, an amalgamation of teenage traits, utterly unlikeable and difficult to sympathise with. At some points in the film, the voices in her head are audible to the viewer, a cacophonous buzz of self-loathing and platitudes gleaned from teen magazine self-help articles. We’re not going to pretend like we were all angels at that age, but Daisy is not an easy protagonist to tolerate, let alone root for. We imagine Kristen Stewart is like this in her everyday life.

It’s at least a little of a good thing, then, that it’s Saoirse Ronan and not Bella Sulkypants in the part. Macdonald called his leading lady “the Meryl Streep of her generation” and that isn’t necessarily hyperbole. Ronan is without her Irish brogue, speaking instead with a convincing American accent. She makes the most of the part and tries to imbue Daisy with something beneath the “like, whatever” exterior. Tom Holland, who was very impressive in tsunami drama The Impossible, is good here too as the 14-year-old who’s still very much a little boy, laughing and playing pranks and still managing to have a good time in spite of the bleak situation that surrounds him. Harley Bird is as chipper as her name (and her character’s name, “Piper”) suggests, but she does sometimes come off as the annoying tag-along kid.



Now, to address the elephant in the room: Daisy romances her first cousin. The term itself isn’t spoken, but there is a “YOLO!” undercurrent beneath most of the film: “We’re young and you only live once, so screw the rules!” MacKay’s Eddie is a quiet, enigmatic animal-whisperer who sweeps Daisy off her feet and teaches her to break free of her neurotic headspace. Young people do impulsive things, yes, but in the midst of this life-or-death ordeal one can’t help but yell at the screen “Guys, you’re not thinking this through!” More often than not, infatuation clouds Daisy’s judgment and her refusal to try and comprehend the bigger picture – that of the impending Third freaking World War – makes it hard to get into How I Live Now.

SUMMARY: It’s sufficiently different from every other teen romance and there’s an intriguing, brutal and sometimes frighteningly realistic backdrop to the proceedings, but its miserable lead character and the unmined potential of the premise mean How I Live Now has trouble sticking.

RATING: 2.5 out of 5 Stars

Jedd Jong