In the Heart of the Sea (2015)

[AndyLL]

Discuss

[Blankments]

In the Heart of the Sea has a terrible first 40 minutes. Like legitimately, I wanted to walk out of the theater after the first twenty minutes, but I decided to stick it out. I was glad I did though, because Howard directs some of the most innovative action setpieces of the year in this. The story is nothing you haven't seen before, but the fact that it's getting made today with the budget this film has is enjoyable in and of itself. That said, I feel like when you delay a movie nine months, the special effects should at least be decent; here they're distractingly bad with the exception of the whale. Going back to that whole "first 40 minutes" thing... I really could not stand anything at the beginning. The forced framing device that really exists just to guarantee a PG-13 rating. Chris Hemsworth's terrible Massachusetts accent. The complete lack of any non-generic character. The bizarre flourishes for style that felt just like trying to be arthouse. But then, after a minor setpiece, everything clicks into place. The characters become fun to follow, Chris Hemsworth stops bothering with the accent and actually acts, and the style flourishes become enjoyable along with some very nice striking cinematography. Unfortunately, as alluded to earlier, Howard misses the mark at points because he's afraid of an R rating for what is really not a mainstream story. I'd love to see what a different director could've done with this material. As it is, In the Heart of the Sea is a fun diversion with nice production value and some really cool scenes, but doesn't elevate to anything more than that. B

[bapi]

Probably the first movie killed by truly awful CGI.

 

4/10

[Klingo]

11 hours ago, bapi said:

Probably the first movie killed by truly awful CGI.

 

4/10

A high budget movie and they can't get the whale to look right?

[ShouldIBeHere]

The Disney version of The Revenant. Sad.

 

The potential was there...

 

5/10

[bapi]

13 hours ago, Klingo said:

A high budget movie and they can't get the whale to look right?

Whales are sort of ok but those green-screens... those green-screens...

[filmlover]

In the Heart of the Sea is one of the worst movies of Ron Howard's illustrious directorial career: a feeble and driftless survival story that makes the high seas and all of its wonders seem, against all odds, boring. The director mostly uses the vast sea as the backdrop for an endless series of repetitive whale attacks (which only illustrate how he's never been known as a filmmaker of a amazing spectacle). Speaking of which, we end up feeling more sympathy for the mammals than we do for any of the seafarers, all of whom are so sketchily developed that the talented actors involved aren't given much to work worth (the film's Life of Pi-esque framing device doesn't bring anything exciting to the table either). Their journey, which is intended to be harrowing, ended up leaving me completely unmoved. I feel like there is a great movie to be made about this story. This, however, is not that movie. C-

[The Panda]

This movie was a really big bore, if you thought Godzilla was bad for not showing Godzilla, this movie is worse.  You see the whale for probably 10 minutes of the movie at the most.  Normally, I wouldn't complain, but everything that doesn't have to do with the whale is so dull that you're sitting there wanting the whale to show up, slap the life boat with it's tail, and end movie already.  

 

To put how boring this movie was into perspective, there were 20 obnoxious gypsies in my theater being loud and annoying.  Halfway through the movie and they were all gone, my guess is not even their own obnoxiousness could make this movie not boring.  The couple sitting in front of me, from the halfway point onward, were pretty much on their phones and making comments to each other the entire time.  Also, as soon as the credits came up, the entire theater simultaneously stood up and walked out.  Everyone was anxious to get out.

 

Were there merits to this movie?  Yes.  There were some nice action set pieces, during the 5 minutes the whale is on screen (for pretty much only one scene).  Although the cinematography could often seem a little try-hard, there were a number of nice pictures created, although it did feel pretty overdone.  Chris Hemsworth also does a decent job for the latter half of the movie.

 

 

Besides that, the movie is simply completely missed potential, and Ron Howard's worst film.  For the first half of the movie Chris Hemsworth is talking in a terrible accent and just isn't believable.  The characters are copy-paste and dry, there's nothing interesting about them, and there's nothing to the story that you haven't seen before.  And to make that worse, most of the movie is simply waiting for something to happen, and when something finally does, it's short, unspectacular, and cuts to the narrative interview.

 

As for the interview thing, the movie is about the author of Moby Dick interviewing a survivor from the Essex.  The guy pretty much says, "You're going to be disappointed," and it's as if he's telling the audience that.  That happens again at the end of the movie where the author of Moby Dick is pretty much like, "Yeah man, I'm just going to make my story fiction.  I'm just going to take the big-ass whale from your story and cut the rest of that boring shit out.  Nobody wants to read that."

 

So I guess you can get a lesson of, 'true stories are often a lot more boring than the glamorized fictional ones.'  But then again, getting that obvious lesson requires you to sit through a boring true story.  The movie felt a good hour longer than it actually was.

 

Id be easier on this movie, because there's obviously talent behind it, but Ron Howard made it.  Ron Howard is a great director and he has not excuse for making a product as boring as In the Heart of the Sea.  Because in the end, this movie isn't just bad, it's boring.  And that's even worse.

F

Edited December 12, 2015 by The Panda

[filmlover]

Honestly, I didn't even think the movie worked when the whales were on screen either, since we're so uninvested in these characters to begin with. Howard has mostly avoided CGI spectacle throughout his career (even How the Grinch Stole Christmas was all production design), and based on the results here, for good reason as he's clearly not at ease with it.

[The Panda]

10 hours ago, filmlover said:

Honestly, I didn't even think the movie worked when the whales were on screen either, since we're so uninvested in these characters to begin with. Howard has mostly avoided CGI spectacle throughout his career (even How the Grinch Stole Christmas was all production design), and based on the results here, for good reason as he's clearly not at ease with it.

 

I mean it worked for me.  I was rooting for the whale to sink the ship and end the boredom, however I don't think that was how you were intended to feel.

[CJohn]

I liked it. The cast was really good and the action scenes were great. The CGI was fine. 8.5/10

[Webslinger]

Handsome in appearance but dreadfully plodding in its storytelling, In the Heart of the Sea is a disappointing venture. On the one hand, the production values are high, Anthony Dod Mantle's cinematography succeeds in capturing both the intimacy of the close quarters the characters share and the vastness of the ocean, and the film nearly springs to life in some of its more visually or emotionally visceral moments. However, for most of its running time, it's a curiously cold experience in which the characters are developed too poorly to hold the viewer's attention during the dialogue-driven portions of the film. Despite having brought several other periods to vivid life in his past work, director Ron Howard seems to be too distant from the heart of this particular story (no pun intended) to make it immediate for viewers. Howard also does a surprisingly weak job with the cast, as accents are shaky across the board and no one - not even the usually charismatic Chris Hemsworth - seems all that invested in their work. Despite highly commendable craft work, In the Heart of the Sea unfortunately fails to live up to its potential to be a riveting survival tale.

 

C

 

And man do I feel bad for any poor sucker who pays to see it in 3D. Mantle's choices as cinematographer definitely do not lend themselves to a post-conversion.

[ladyevenstar22]

i saw this last night and it left me wanting like i was expecting something more epic befitting the moby dick story , the back and forth between the writer hearing the story and the actual story was annoying , we get it you're telling a story we don't need to cut back to you every now and then kinda killed the buzz on the sea side of the movie !

also i was pretty disappointed the ship gets sunk real early after that i'm like huh jaws did this part of the story way better , they showed a whale that looked battered so yeah that was a let down i was expecting a crazy fight between the two where the ship would have put up more of a fight hurt the whale a bit ehh nada de nada pff , then the castaway/alive bit was also meh ,  when i hear the writer say he was the only survivor at beginning i thought ooh this might be a doozy where shit goes down its brutal violent man vs beast and they throw crazy punches at each other then they both die and that kid is the only survivor picked up weeks later by a passing ship , the lone witness of this tragedy ! 

 

guess not ! B- for not living up to its potential

 

[James]

Can't believe I haven't seen this till now. So damn good, from acting, to the story, to the emotional punch.

 

A

Edited March 1, 2016 by James