I expected the worst

Rating: Null/10 (6 November 2002)

Watching movies on planes is an interesting experience, because often they are the kind of movies I would never watch otherwise. K-19 is exactly the kind of movie I would not watch, even if it were broadcast on network TV. The movie is about Harrison Ford facing difficult moral dilemmas--this premise leaves little room for surprise.
Indeed, there is very little surprise about the plot of the movie, but there are, usually pleasant, surprises in other places.
The first one is a rather successful take on moral ambiguity, moral dillemmas and even the inevitable tragedy coming out of that. Because the protagonists are not American the movie does not have to patriotically and unambiguously identify the good guys and the bad guys, exalt the former and demonize the latter. Also, it is not the case that the good guys must prevail. This leaves room for some interesting character development, especially the sacked Cpt Polenin (Neeson) and the terrified junior officer in charge of the reactor. Cpt Vostrikov (Ford) is also an interesting enough character, retaining his moral ambiguity until the very end. We never know what his real motives are, and we never know if he is for real.
The attempt of making a character-driven blockbuster movie is brave and I appreciate it. It is doubtful that it can work though. The explosions are not big enough to excite the crowd who goes for the blockbuster part, and the ambiguity of the movie is perhaps confusing. The character development, on the other hand, is still rather simplistic and it will not impress the more discerning viewer.
On the negative side, I thought the Russian-ness of the movie did not work very well at all. The crew had the stiff and caricatural demeanor usually associated to Russians by typical cold war movies. I just can't buy that that's the way the Russian sailor acts.
But I want to end on a positive, because I did like the movie, warts and all. There is some genuine high drama in the movie, especially the ritual of sailors preparing to walk into the reactor room to fix the leak, to certain horrendous death. There is also some genuine insight in Capt. Vostrikov comment in the conclusion of the movie.
Not bad for a plane movie at all.