In the Heart of the Sea tells the story behind Moby Dick. It begins with Herman Melville tracking down
the last survivor of the Essex, the notorious ship that was attacked by a giant
white whale. There was a smidgeon of a
good idea here, but unfortunately, the story it inspired is a lot more
entertaining than the real deal.
Is there a reason to tell this tale? Did anyone really ask for a realistic version
of Moby Dick? I mean who UNDERSELLS a
fish story? Fish stories are SUPPOSED to
be tall tales that are larger than life.
What the fuck, Opie?
Thor, Spider-Man and Scarecrow go out into the middle of the
ocean looking for whale oil. The captain
is a rich boy who’s never captained a boat before. They run into the monstrous
whale that attacks the boat and shipwrecks the crew.
What surprised me most about In the Heart of the Sea was that
the whale attack happens halfway through the film. From there, it becomes a tale of survival. Think Alive in a lifeboat. This could’ve worked, but Howard is too much
of a nice guy to go all out during these scenes. I mean, if you’re going to have cannibalism
in a movie, show the damned cannibalism! Don’t pussy out and cut back to the
narrator.
I get why this material resonated with Howard. It’s thematically similar to Apollo 13. It’s another historical tale of
survival. That doesn’t mean it’s very
good though.
The camerawork is often odd.
He uses a lot of weird camera angles aboard the boat for no good reason.
(Unless Howard was trying to make us
seasick.) It’s also a really ugly looking
movie too. Much of the film has a garish
yellow tint to it. It almost looks as if
someone pissed on the camera lens or something.
There is one gnarly moment when Spider-Man crawls into a dead
whale’s blowhole to dig out the last bits of oil. If anything, Howard does a good job showing
the lengths men would go through to get oil back in the 1820s. It’s a good thing men stopped doing shady
shit for oil after this incident.
As far as Ron Howard movies go, it’s no Gung Ho.
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