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The Perfect Storm was one of the most heavily promoted blockbusters
of 2000, with trailers being shown many months before the actual
release date. This lead to a great deal of hype and expectation
regarding the action and special effects. The end result lives
up to the hype but the main problem is that most of the effects
have already been given away in the trailers, thereby reducing
the value of actually going to see the film itself (compare
this to the more carefully managed promotion of Jurassic Park
- you really did have to go to the film to see the dinosaurs).
This film is based on the book by Sebastian Unger which itself
was based on actual events that occurred in October 1991. To
quote from the oft seen trailer, the fishing boat Andrea Gail
left Gloucester, Massachusetts heading for the fishing grounds
of the North Atlantic. The crew, led by captain George Clooney
are desperate for a big haul of swordfish to make up for the
meagre financial returns from their previous few trips. I'm
not giving away too much of the story to say that, once out
in the ocean, they encounter a particularly nasty storm formed
by the collision of three hurricane-like weather systems. In
addition, Just in case we get bored of seeing too much of this
one crew, the film also takes a look at the rescue of some useless
fair-weather sailors at the hands of some spectacularly brave
Coast Guard patrolmen.
While the special effects and the storm action are pretty good,
they are not overly interesting in themselves and add little
what has not already been seen in the disaster movie genre.
In this sense, it is no more than Titanic meets Twister. What
this film does add, however, is a view into the tough lives
led by Atlantic fishermen. The best part of this film is the
way we are shown the hard decisions that these men have to make
in order to sustain their livelihood.
Most of the cast put in passable performances, with Clooney
(who manages to maintain a 3 day beard growth throughout the
entire film) believable as the determined fishing captain and
Mark Wahlberg reasonable enough as the young protégé
torn between his girlfriend on land and his work at sea. Reliable
character actors John C. Reilly and William Fichtner are also
pretty good as the constantly dueling crewmen.
Overall, although it does not quite live up to its lofty expectations,
this is still a reasonably good film which draws much of its
power not from special effects but from the knowledge that these
events actually happened.
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