A Story That Needed to be Told

Rating: 6/10 (14 December 2002)

As entertainment, this is at best an average movie. The story drags at several points and the Russian accents affected by Harrison Ford and other characters are more distracting than anything else.
Yet, this is a story that needed to be told. The sailors and officers of the K-19 were not just heroes of their country, but men to whom all of us who lived through the Cold War owe thanks. By putting sacrificing their careers and, in many cases, their lives, they saved the world from what could have been (at worst) a war and (at best) a horrible ecological disaster. They did so by doing their jobs and serving their country.
So, though the film is only mediocre, I recommend it to anyone who wants a peak at history through the eyes of the ordinary military men whose stories are so seldom told. And I commend Harrison Ford for bringing the story of to the screen, so that these men might get the recognition they are due.