The worst oil spill in US history makes for a technical spectacle.

Rating: 8/10 (3 October 2016)

The biographical disaster film about the titular oil rig, Deepwater Horizon is about the blowout and explosion of the oil rig and how it became the largest oil spill in US history. The trailers showed this to be an epic disaster film, but it is so much more than that...in fact this actually touched my heart. For the majority of the film it is a technical spectacle of explosions, fire, mud and more explosions, but then the last 10 minutes happen and it hits you right in the heart. There is not much to spoil, everyone knows what happened...but I shall not mention any specifics. This was a great chance for Mark Wahlberg to show off some acting and he did so reasonably well, but it was actually Kurt Russell who really showed his on-screen presence. The rest of the cast were also great, no one bad here. What everyone comes to watch in a disaster film are the effects, the visuals...and this film delivers by the bucket load. Plenty of fiery explosions and plenty of danger to keep viewers enthralled by the experience and just to try and empathise with the real people that went through this. That's where the film shines, when it reminds the viewers that these people were real and these events actually happened. The last 10 minutes showcases this beautifully with a touching tribute to those who lost their lives. The first half of the film builds up the suspense of the inevitable and actually informs us on what working on an oil rig is like, it was rather informative and I enjoyed it. From time to time the script does struggle in connecting Kate Hudson to the story and the family life of Wahlberg's character, it was as if they were trying to force it and sometimes it did not work. What did not work at all though were many of the camera shots, it seemed extremely zoomed in as if it was trying to enhance the frantic mayhem but if anything it just infuriated me that I couldn't see what was going on. Thankfully this did not happen all the time, but director Peter Berg (who directed Lone Survivor) knows better. Overall, Deepwater Horizon is a technical spectacle of a biographical disaster film with an emotional payoff that I did not see coming.

Review at: http://www.themoviediorama.com