Before The Door Pictures, Washington Square Films, Black Bear Pictures,
Robert Redford
Robert Redford is cast as “Our Man” in this silent film. Well, not silent, but bereft of any dialog other than a cuss or two and a few words spoken into a broken radio. This is a story of a lone man on a cruise deep into the Indian Ocean who while sleeping has the boat struck by a floating shipping container. The boat is badly damaged, not only with a hole in the hull, but most of the equipment on the boat, both mechanical and electronic is also broken. He is facing a storm, stranded alone, and must try his best to survive in the middle of the ocean.
I must tell you this right away! I have NEVER done this before. I have never tried to review a movie that I have not seen. But let me tell you my experience with this one!
I popped the DVD into the player and hit play. I was presented with a brief opening narration, then presented with a guy going upstairs and downstairs, fiddling with this and that, fixing something to eat, pumping out his boat, and doing the most mundane tasks for what seemed like hours. This felt like it was all going in real time. We watched him eat and drink, fix things, all silently without any dialog at all, not even voice over telling us what he was trying to do. I felt sorry for the guy, even if he was Robert Redford, but I was bored to tears. After about 20 minutes of this, I found I was completely tuning out on the whole thing, so I turned it off. The next day I tried it again. I fast forwarded over to where I thought I was before, but having not marked down the point at which I stopped it…it was somewhere when the foul weather was busting up things, I decided to give it another go. I just couldn’t take it, so I packed the DVD back in the envelope, carried it out to the mailbox, and then I just stood there debating on whether to try it again or just send it back. Finally the though came into my head that I had no need to torture myself with this boring piece of film one more minute, so I dropped it into the mailbox. Would I give it another try sometime? Nah, life is to short. I’m sure there may be some fans of sailing out there that would love to watch home movies of some guy’s adventure (even if it is Robert Redford) go through the day to day tasks on a sinking ship in a storm, but it’s just not me. There are so many other movies out there to watch that I am not going to give this one another try.
So ignore this review, if you wish. Take the one star I gave it, and disregard it. I couldn’t stomach it, but if you thin you’ll like this self indulgent indie film without words, by all means go for it. Likewise, if there is someone out there who watched this all the way through to the sappy ending and loved it, I would really appreciate your comments on this posting letting me know why you liked it and what I am missing. I really would be happy to hear your opinions on this. For me, this is the first movie that was simply impossible for me to watch all the way through.
EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog
