RogerBW's Blog

Bølgen 05 February 2018

2015 Norwegian disaster film, dir. Roar Uthaug, Kristoffer Joner, Ane Dahl Torp: IMDb / allmovie. The Åkerneset mountain overlooks the tourist village of Geiranger, but a landslide could cause a tidal wave along the fjord. It's going to. vt The Wave.

Disaster films as a genre are generally split into the ones about averting the disaster and the ones about dealing with it. This is mostly the latter sort, but the disaster doesn't happen until half-way through the film. It's never dull, though: Kristian, our geologist-hero, is leaving his job monitoring the mountain to work for the oil companies in Stavanger, his family's unhappy about the move but coping with it, and the monitors on the rock face are starting to show anomalous readings…

In terms of plot structure, this film enthusiastically follows the standard disaster film pattern; but the clichés mostly flow logically out of plausible situations. Yes, the chief geologist doesn't want to sound the alarm in the middle of tourist season; but that's because the evidence really isn't enough to justify a total evacuation, unless you're a Mountain Whisperer like Kristian. Still, the plot is the weakest thing here, and if you've seen disaster films before you won't encounter any surprises.

On the other hand, everything else is great, and that does mostly make up for it. The cast are allowed to look like real people, not Hollywood dolls; the script lets them behave like grown-ups, occasionally making mistakes or overreacting to things, but realising that they've erred and apologising for it. With both of those things supporting their acting, their emotions feel genuine (the relationship between Kristian and his wife Idun, in particular, is superbly realistic). The standard problem of disaster films, that the humanising elements feel pasted-in and unconvincing, are thus avoided; indeed, at times it all feels quite harrowing.

Special effects are significant, but never seem overdone. The camera-work is superb, showing off gorgeous Norwegian fjord country at its best and worst; and the camera doesn't shy away, as many modern American films do, from showing dead bodies where there ought to be dead bodies.

It's not perfect, but it's pretty good. This is apparently the first Scandinavian-made disaster film; I wouldn't encourage them to stick this closely to the template again, but I'd certainly like to see more from cast and crew who are this good. Alas, director Roar Uthaug has been taken away by Hollywood; his next film is Tomb Raider. Oh well. At least we have this.

Trailer here; MaryAnn Johanson's review here.

[Buy this at Amazon] and help support the blog. ["As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases."]

Comments on this post are now closed. If you have particular grounds for adding a late comment, comment on a more recent post quoting the URL of this one.

Search
Archive
Tags 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s 2000s 2010s 3d printing action advent of code aeronautics aikakirja anecdote animation anime army astronomy audio audio tech aviation base commerce battletech beer boardgaming book of the week bookmonth chain of command children chris chronicle church of no redeeming virtues cold war comedy computing contemporary cornish smuggler cosmic encounter coup covid-19 crime cthulhu eternal cycling dead of winter doctor who documentary drama driving drone ecchi economics en garde espionage essen 2015 essen 2016 essen 2017 essen 2018 essen 2019 essen 2022 essen 2023 existential risk falklands war fandom fanfic fantasy feminism film firefly first world war flash point flight simulation food garmin drive gazebo genesys geocaching geodata gin gkp gurps gurps 101 gus harpoon historical history horror hugo 2014 hugo 2015 hugo 2016 hugo 2017 hugo 2018 hugo 2019 hugo 2020 hugo 2022 hugo-nebula reread in brief avoid instrumented life javascript julian simpson julie enfield kickstarter kotlin learn to play leaving earth linux liquor lovecraftiana lua mecha men with beards mpd museum music mystery naval noir non-fiction one for the brow opera parody paul temple perl perl weekly challenge photography podcast politics postscript powers prediction privacy project woolsack pyracantha python quantum rail raku ranting raspberry pi reading reading boardgames social real life restaurant reviews romance rpg a day rpgs ruby rust scala science fiction scythe second world war security shipwreck simutrans smartphone south atlantic war squaddies stationery steampunk stuarts suburbia superheroes suspense television the resistance the weekly challenge thirsty meeples thriller tin soldier torg toys trailers travel type 26 type 31 type 45 vietnam war war wargaming weather wives and sweethearts writing about writing x-wing young adult
Special All book reviews, All film reviews
Produced by aikakirja v0.1