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Reviews
The Perfect Storm (2000)
Over the top and unbelievable
This movie should have led to riots in every commercial fishing port in the country. The characters are portrayed as dull witted hooligans who cheer like people at a professional football game each time their boat manages to make it through one more wave. Most of the insight and depth of the original, and excellent, book were lost in this tawdry but expensive adaptation.
Reality is suspended as in one cruise we have an on deck shark attack, an individual dragged overboard by the long line, and finally, a storm. Note that either of the first two incidents would have resulted in a return to port as massive infection and blood poisoning would have set in within hours in the injured crew person. One unbelievable scene has the crew waiting until the predicted storm has hit them with full fury before attempting to install the storm boards on the boat.
On shore we have the obligate scene of an evil capitalist, in this case the boat owner, which seems a requirement in every movie made by large conglomerates. The owner is portrayed as a cartoon cut out cross between an unreformed Ebenezer Scrooge and Simon Legree. We never see the fishermen on shore participate in any activity other than drinking or fighting, which comes as a surprise to anyone who has ever lived in a fishing port, be it Newport, OR, or anywhere back east or down south. Character depth is discarded in favor of cheap and bizarre events at sea, and we miss the more profound juxtapositions found in Junger's book.
For those who enjoyed the book, I recommend also reading Lost at Sea by Patrick Dillon which tells the sad story of the loss of one of the A boats out of Anacortes, WA.
Rage (1966)
An interesting character study set in rural New Mexico
I enjoyed this movie a great deal; it has an interesting development of characters set within a construction camp for a major highway in rural New Mexico. Early in the film a local herder is brought in dying of rabies; the veterinarian becomes involved in a search for the source of the disease and whether it is part of an epidemic. A major side plot in the movie is the relationship between the veterinarian and a construction camp prostitute. There is a great deal of character development, and the lady's occupation is so subtly portrayed that it is an acceptable moview for older children. There is a great deal of empathy for the hard lives lived in a construction camp and its surrounding rural poverty.
Unlike most movies set in a rural atmosphere, the country people and blue collar workers are not cartoon buffoons or evil, violent troglodytes. This sensitive portrayal contrasts markedly with the brutal louts recently portrayed in a certain movie about commercial fishermen lost at sea, the Perfect Storm.