Deepwater Horizon – Film Review

Cast: Mark Wahlberg, Kurt Russell, Gina Rodriguez, Kate Hudson, Dylan O’Brien

Director: Peter Berg

Synopsis: An account of the 2010 BP Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico and the desperate bid by the workers of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig to stay alive.

Review: Making a film about a true to life disaster cannot be an easy subject matter to tackle, especially if the disaster that you’re focusing on just happens to be the worst ever oil disaster in US history, and one that cost the company behind the oil rig, British Petroleum a whopping 18.7 BILLION dollars in fines after a total of just under 5 million barrels of oil spilled out into the sea, causing devastation for the local environment and for the nearby communities, and also claimed the lives of 11 of the men working on the oil rig.

After directing the gripping Lone Survivor, Peter Berg along with screenwriters Matthew Michael Carnahan and Matthew Sand, certainly do their best to tell this story and tell it in a very gripping manner. The first act is a little slow at times, but the build up is necessary as with each passing minute of screen time, and every test that they make whilst on the rig, the tension is built up ever so slightly. You just know that something is not right, and any minute things will go wrong, Soon, it gets to the point when you know, that sooner or later, the shit (or mud in this case) will hit the fan and the rig workers have an unmitigated catastrophe on their hands and soon are in a desperate bid to get off the rig before they go down with it. Once the disaster has struck, the tension is enormous and it remains that way for the rest of the movie.

Berg wasn’t the original director attached to the project as originally it was J.C. Chandor who was set to be calling the shots. Yet due to creative differences Chandor left and Berg came on board, reuniting with his Lone Survivor co star, Marky Mark Wahlberg. It’s from his perspective as real life oil rig worker Mike Williams that we watch with bated breath as the bumbling BP idiots naively assume that there’s nothing wrong with the rig, but Williams and the rest of the crew led by Mr Jimmy Harrell (Kurt Russell) know otherwise. Wahlberg’s performance is the centrepiece of the film, and it’s his character that we get to know the most with his wife (Kate Hudson) and daughter. Beyond him, there isn’t much character development to really any of the other characters, but all involved give excellent performances.

Berg helms this project excellently, with confident and assured direction throughout, but especially when the drama has fully unfolded. The production design to recreate the oil rig is tremendous and the camerawork and the fast editing does a great job to to heighten the tension when the workers find themselves in peril. These scenes are packed with tension right throughout as you will these people to safety. “Hope is not a tactic” reads the film’s poster, and in this situation, hope could be the difference between life and death. With a thought provoking and moving ending, and one that could and should get you all riled up. When considering how this tragedy came about, how no one was found culpable is almost beyond belief. It was one that changed lives forever and is almost certainly still having an effect on lives to this day, and one that will have you thinking once the credits begin to roll.