Brutal at times despite its problems (SPOILERS)

Rating: Null/10 (10 March 2013)

At some point there was going to be a big budget film about this tragedy, so to hear there was one was not a surprise nor something that upset me since it was always coming. The film is based on the true story of a Spanish family who somehow managed to survive the disaster, finding each other and making it home alive, although here the family are played as English but they are the focal point. We waste very little time at the start in setting the characters before they get hit by a wall of special effects in a sequence that is impacting, upsetting and incredibly tense.
Visually there are some weaknesses in the effects but the camera-work covers a lot of them and the sound editing does the rest. In fact it is unfair to list the sound at the end of that sentence like an afterthought, because the sound in this sequence is amazing – it is everywhere and it is terrifying, even on a home stereo it still works. This is the real core of the film and it delivers because it stays with you the rest of the film as it should. From here the focus is more on the human tragedy, separated families, death, lack of information and so on. This aspects also works pretty well and is greatly helped by strong performances from Watts and McGregor but more importantly from the three boys, who are convincing throughout the film.
It is not without problems though. The focus on one family and their (comparatively) happy ending is a necessary evil, but it is still an "evil" in terms of the saying. The film spends a lot of time with holiday makers and westerners and not much with those living and working there; they are visible sure, but not much more that than. The decision to switch nationalities seems pointless and I'm not sure why they did it – they could easily have made the film in English with Spanish actors without it being less accessible and still appealing to the American market. This doesn't matter too much – but it does feel odd. Considering how well it impacts at some points, I also didn't understand why at other times it feels the need to really syrup on the emotion; the music is just what you expect and it comes up just when you know it will and it stirs upwards telling you what to feel; personally I didn't need it and it felt heavy handed too often.
That said, it is still an impacting film and is worth a look. It does have problems but mostly it gets past them by virtue of the subject matter and the mostly strong delivery. This film was always going to be made and for sure it could have been a lot weaker than this.