"Hostile Waters" with whistles and bells..........................

Rating: 6/10 (10 April 2009)

Mr Liam Neeson and Mr Harrison Ford growl at each other like two grumpy old bears fighting over a hollow tree trunk.The loyalty of the O.R.s is stretched to breaking point as each manipulates his acolytes amongst the crew and lots of brave submariners sacrifice their lives to save their shipmates from a "Chernobyl" 25 years before its time. Clearly "K 19" is an unlucky ship.Sailors,superstitious creatures that they are, will be crossing their fingers,stroking their rabbits' feet etc right from the start of the movie as the bad omens mount up. However,a nuclear meltdown is not a nuclear explosion and the threat to world peace is rather exaggerated.Not that that in any way lessens their heroism,but hyperbole tends to detract from authenticity. Having recently watched Rutger Hauer's brilliant earlier "Hostile Waters", made on a low budget for TV,I can only remark on the similarity - which of course can only be a coincidence - to the basic plot of submariners risking their lives trying to fix a damaged nuclear reactor. Certainly Russia was paranoid about news leaking out to the West,it didn't acknowledge Chernobyl until it became self-evident,and then declined help from the U.S.,so it is easy to imagine that,a quarter of a century earlier,at the height of the Cold War,Premier Kruschev would not have looked kindly upon a submarine commander who sought assistance from the hated,feared and despised Americans. After "detente" came "glasnost" and the peace dividend of hundreds of Russian nuclear submarines rotting away somewhere in the Arctic Circle, an environmental ticking bomb far more immediately dangerous than any "Global Warming" theory. "K 19 - Widowmaker" is not a bad movie,it might have even been a timely reminder that heroism doesn't necessarily have to come wrapped in the Stars and Stripes,but it is long,noisy,and a bit over the top,a "Titanic" of submarine pictures.Neither Mr Neesom nor Mr Ford are particularly comfortable in their roles;charging up and down in a sweaty radioactive submarine is definitely work for one of the newer fellows."Hostile Waters" with whistles and bells" is about what it amounts to.