In this section of the year which is characterised by awards, Cannes included, and in which Toronto and other studios are properly ‘Weinsteining’ for an Oscar nomination, it is somehow a relief to find a typical genre film – or rather, a thriller – that just wants to be taken out for a couple of hours and, I guess, has no real goals other than that. Underwater escapade Black Sea is a new flick directed by Scottish Kevin Macdonald who won the Academy award for his documentary One Day in September; yet, here, he is trying to locate himself back to one of his more commercially successful features How I Live Now or Romans-vs.-Picts exploitation movie The Eagle. Any psychological insight, for, a very dubious term in this genre, revolves only around the film’s underwater plot. There is no problem with this either.
Considering his background in made-for-TV movies (let us not forget that Macdonald also produced the excellent documantry on mountaineering Touching the Void), it is striking how ventures are made to place Black Sea within the confines of reality from the beginning. We first meet the film’s central character Robinson, a middle-aged former captain of the submarine and now an ex-navy, being fired from a naval salvage company. The dwindling pride leads him to part ways with his wife, further refuse associating with his son, and sink with the fortune whose amount is lowering down both crass and polite society level. There is the additional point of the Captain running towards an armoured car with apprehension of what may hit me from behind. So it is not surprising that, after hearing about a possible cache of Nazi gold hidden in a U-boat off the coast of Georgia, he wishes to recover the treasure and get even with the system which is against him and his working man crew.
Everything can easily move round like the Indian Ocean rather than boiling when it comes to two important very visible features of this set-up. First, the premise is exasperating partly because it requires total suspension of disbelief that a) no one has tired getting securing hundreds of millions of dollars before and some ‘encouragers’ are palm-sized two story wooden structures exactly. In all fairness, the ownership aspect of this issue is tackled in part by a plot twist that occurs unexpectedly in the final narrative, however, it is quite evident that we are deep into Movieland logic and the whole ngemphasis on exploited – but impotently so- working class is one jarring antithesis to the grossing fictitious populist novel. For clarity, highbrow comparisons stick rigidly to a certain temperate zone that is somewhere in-between the drab realities of working class Britons in this instance and the theatrical ‘impressiveness’ of Ocean’s Eleven theatre production assisting in stylistic recreation of working class britains these 2, in league with other concepts such as the ‘gives-me-a-leeway to Capitulate’ copyright concept. Obviously the best part of ocean eleven turned out to be parts not directed by Steven Soderbergh as he was lost in the too many shots of pacing himself. Z)embedding on imaginations which are further blamed on Ken loach, whose films, plays even their blurbs are examined, as bourgeoise-confronting dramas.. For male entertainment, this panorama has a repertoire stretching from scantily clad ladies such as Pamela Anderson to the leather jerkin and chiselled jaws of bonds and sth… Everything except your picture can be considered as a decor to enhance your imagination. Thus why, blowing the plaster goes last fun provoking president. Even at its most sympathetic, this is a parody with no spark of originality.
To his credit, however, it must be said that Law mostly pulls it off. His performance can be compared to that of two children in Leon and Don Hemingway, in the second case it is quite obvious that he chose to enter a more of a character actor phase. If Law a la craggy Pitts is no longer worrying about his receding hairline. Loosened up, he looked bulked out too – in a good way not the gym bunny six packs kind – His overstuffed Scottish mother accent as with the pate is hit and miss. There are mockers who shall still scoff but those who are more forgiving shall give some credit to the work.
Therefore, once you suspend your disbelief as to the absurdity of the premise and accept Jude Law as the protagonist, there are many positives to the story. The men are persuaded by the salesman into employing a knackered ‘vintage’ russian sub and reassured ‘there is some wisdom in being an old whore and/or ok it does know how to please its customers’. This then leads to the best dialogue in the whole movie where corporate lackey Daniels (Scoot McNairy) panics and says, “This wreck’s going to sink.”. “It’d be a f***in’ useless sub if it don’t,” responds a weathered member of the crew in a brusque manner.
Macdonald propels the plot in a speedy motion rather his old clunker boat, bypassing the contrivances and with great haste at times establishing the disparate tensions of the Russians and British. Even though Robinson insisted that each man gets the same share, such suspicions and prejudices cause the first of several disasters that threaten to bring the entire venture to an end. Robinson does rather raise the question why one needs to hire the celebrated madman of a persuader named Fraser (Ben Mendlesohn, in most part wasted) and a 17 years old rookie from Liverpool Tobin (Bobby Schofield) for these tasks. Well or rather, probably, you don’t have to.
Some aspects of Black Sea’s success can be attributed to the employment of familiar submarine movie clichés: a rival ship immersing its crew in sickening tension by pulsing an enemy sonar, or carrying water during the panicked run over catwalks enclosed with cast-iron walls. Strangely, the spins on the formula or departures from it are the worst parts of the whole movie. The plot where desperate souls overwhelmed by craving gold is presented is bland. There are too many melodramas between Tobin and his surrogate father Rivera… Just kidding, it is interstitial just, even a child is such a threat. I mean the entire gauzy, sentimental, family flashback is tired. In the nautical disaster movie, Ahoy, a Russian college degree, American college, Roberts Redford’s character had no backstory – it played out so flat. The verdict has been pronounced.
It’s no Das Boot – though what submarine movie is? – and lowers the class-struggle and family drama sticks inside like an anchor but for teh cutting edge of the brisk and brawny deep sea action thespaceormore Black Sea unlike its unfortunate crew, delivers. Want comfort food in a season of films that marketed themselves as fine-dining cinematic experiences? There are times that an old fashioned sub can hit the spot.
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