On Aug. 12, 1819, the whaling ship Essex left Nantucket with a fresh lease on life. Wanting to keep it operational as long as possible, the company that owned the ship had given it a complete overhaul and expected its captain and crew to bring back more than 2,000 gallons of precious whale oil over the course of a twoand-half-year voyage. At 88 feet in length, the Essex was considered small for a vessel of its type but that never prevented it from being one of the most profitable of ships, so much so that it had garnered the reputation as being lucky. However, its reputation would be irreparably damaged during the voyage as a series of poor decisions and freak occurrences doomed its crew, ultimately forcing them to act beyond reason in order to survive, something only eight of the 20 men on board were able to accomplish.
Ron Howard’s In the Heart of the Sea takes on the challenging task of telling this harrowing tale of survival and does so with mixed results. While the filmmaker does an exceptional job of staging the whale hunts that provide these men with sustenance at the risk of life and limb, the story of the crew’s fight for survival after an unprecedented event is another matter entirely. Disjointed and tripped up by gaping holes in its narrative, the film flounders about, giving us a CliffsNotes version of the events that lack any depth.
Told through a rather awkward framing device, the film opens with eager, young author Herman Melville (Ben Whishaw) at the home of one of the survivors of the Essex disaster, Tom Nickerson (Brendan Gleeson). Having never talked of his experiences before, he’s urged by his wife to unburden himself, and in doing so, we see all he and his mates went through in a series of flashbacks that are beautifully mounted yet flawed in their pacing.
Through the old man’s eyes and foggy memory we meet First Mate Owen Chase (Chris Hemsworth), a man that inspires faith in his crew, both in deed and manner. Going to sea with a chip on his shoulder as he’s forced to serve under the inexperienced Captain George Pollard (Benjamin Walker), the man gains the crew’s trust when he deftly saves one of their own soon after leaving port. His expertise as a whaler becomes obvious when they first set out in the boats to hunt their prey, his best friend Matthew Joy (Cillian Murphy) helping him at every turn. However when Pollard, forced by fished-out waters, decides to head to the faroff reaches of the South Pacific where pods of whales are reported to be living, he unwittingly dooms those under his command.
The whale hunting scenes are very wellstaged as Howard places his camera not only inside the tiny boats brimming with men, harpoons and rope, but under the water as well, tracking these enormous creatures. Not only does this add a unique perspective, it effectively provides a sense of scale that underscores just how foolhardy this practice was. There’s a sense of danger at play but also one of excitement, as the film conveys the sort of rush and sense of pride Chase and ilk felt in their pursuit. Equally impressive is the sequence in which a large sperm whale slams into and capsizes the Essex, a moment that not only elicits fear but also a sense of awe regarding the power of this mighty creature and his vengeance.
This event casts the crew adrift in their boats, beginning a trial that would last for over 90 days and see the men ultimately resort to cannibalism in order to survive. There’s a sense that Howard is uncomfortable with this aspect of the story as the scope of these atrocities is hardly touched upon (in the end, seven crew members were eaten), while the time devoted to the men’s ordeal hardly provides a true sense of how long they were adrift. Instead Howard and screenwriter Charles Leavitt resort to adding scenes of pure fiction wherein the whale is seen pursuing and attacking the men again and again. All of this is unnecessary as there’s enough drama inherent in the tale of the Essex and its crew that it doesn’t need to resort to these sorts of foolish ends. In failing to trust in the material it has at hand, Sea fails to provide the human element necessary to makes us care for its characters, leaving us with an empty climax.
Contact Chuck Koplinski at [email protected].
