told you I would do it. don't you feel the fool.
I’m going to be honest.
I went to The Impossible with relatively low expectations. I hadn’t
heard much about the film, just the odd bit of critical praise and obviously
the subject matter. I went expecting a better than average but rather twee
movie. One of those that would have, perhaps, been better suited to a T.V
movie. The cast seemed to support this argument for me. Both Ewan McGregor and
Naomi Watts, whilst talented thespians had seemingly spent the last few years
starring in passable films compared to the modern classics that were once their
forte.
My expectations were not altered when the film began. Some
nice shots of Thailand coupled with a rich white family, a mother and father
with three boys, one of which confused becoming a teenager with becoming a bit
of a nob, going on an expensive beach holiday in Thailand. Credit where it’s
due, the cast and director did manage to make the characters very believable in
a short space of time meaning that after only about ten minutes I cared about
them all. But still, so far so twee, albeit skilfully so. This could have been
a fine way to start the film if not for one thing. The opening scenes were
peppered with ominous shots of the sea. An odd angle here, a minor chord there,
all serving to tell us that in this film the picturesque sea is the enemy. I
for one found this unnecessarily comedic. Anyone going to see The Impossible
will have a slight knowledge that it is about the tsunami and will therefore
know what it is about. The sinister sea shots felt like something from an
especially bad episode of doctor who and even made me think my expectations had
been too high, I had horrors of having to sit through Obi Wan vs. the sea.
Then the wave hit and all my doubts were destroyed in the
chaos.
Yes chaos. To see such a force of nature hurtling towards me
taking everything in its path was truly exhilarating. But then the horror, what
about the Kenobis? What followed was a heart wrenchingly intense period of
desperate survival and hopeless searching. The mother and the eldest boy were
swept away by the flood and faced some horrific injuries and witnessed a lot of
the devastation. They had to survive not only relapses of the tsunami but they
had to find their way across an unrecognisable landscape for even the locales
never mind tourists. Even when taken out of the land and placed into a hospital
the intensity never let up, becoming a more focused assault on emotion casting
aside the assault on the senses that came with the wave. With the mother being confined to the
hospital bed are focus was drawn to the teenager who took us on his journey
with him. We felt the hopelessness cast aside through helping out in small ways
in the hospital; we felt the intense pain and panic in the moments when he was separated
from his mother. To say he started the film as generic angst ridden teenager
this transformation was truly a revelation.
Sometimes I am a bit of a cynic when it comes to films. A film
will have to try very hard to convince me that a main character is truly in any
danger. Well this certainly did the impossible….im sorry no more puns, come
back, please? I have cake? Yes from the moment the tsunami hit I felt that
these characters were in danger, at times I say no way that they could survive.
For a time after the wave, the film solely focuses on the mother and teenager so
I thought Ewan was a goner. This sense of danger is at its highest when
focusing on the mother. And it’s one that never lets up.
The segments following Ewan McGregor and the other children
are thankfully not as intense in the same sense. I say thankfully because, I don’t
think I could have handled it, I was close enough to walking out of the cinema
as it was, but also because it provides the dizzying chaotic highs, with
sombre, reflective lows. He searches desperately for his family, going as far
to leave the two other children in apparent safety, in order to do something
that to everyone else seems so hopeless. Again these segments are heart wrenching but
for different reasons, for these segments provide hope and humility. But again,
finding them does not guarantee a happy ending.
To discuss any more of the plot would be to spoil it so I shall
instead talk again about the acting. The entire cast is superb. The two smaller
children are given the least to do but this means their moments are believable
and credit goes to them for showing signs of the ordeal they have faced off
screen. Ewan McGregor is, for reasons I have already mentioned, fantastic as is
Tom Holland as the teenaged Lucas. It truly is a fantastic ensemble cast but
plaudits should definitely go to Naomi Watts. Whenever she is on screen she
grabs your attention without trying, she plays the mother desperate to protect
her child brilliantly because she refrains from going too far. In some films
she would have appeared almost superhuman in terms of what she overcomes to get
to safety. Yes in the film she manages to walk, run and even climb a tree with
a nasty leg wound but you see it taking its toll on her. The fantastic thing is
that you see her first reactions are always towards Lucas’ but always with some
personal detriment to her own being, even at her most ill it is evident she
would cause her own death if it meant the survival of her son.
After the initial TV drama affair, the direction
cinematography really comes good. A hand held, ‘shaky’ cam style is used to
really delve the audience into the chaos of the situation. It’s not like other
films where it feels gimmicky, in settings like the crowded hospital you could
think it was an accident and the camera man really was just getting jostled by
the crowds; such is the level of immersion in this movie. That, said the truly
great moments are those in the water. A mix of surface level and underwater shots
allow us to follow the bodies as they are pulled along by the tsunami allowing
us to truly feel the intensity and power of the wave.
Unfortunately this isn’t a perfect film. Aside from the ,
granted probably intentional choices, elements I didn’t like at the beginning
of the film there are certain issues people may find with it. Firstly it is an
overly westernised account of the tsunami. One may argue that this made it more
relatable, and that’s fair enough; it did. There locale characters used, yet
they always seem to be helping the white tourists. Yes this paints them in a
great light as far as the west is concerned but I would have liked to have seen
the effects on them and their way of life more because they can’t fly home they
have to live with the devastation.
In conclusion, The Impossible is a truly excellent film
within itself despite possible contextual and ethical grievances. Forget explosions
and chiselled muscled action heroes running from them and firing cars at
helicopters, The Impossible is a true edge of your seat film, that will leave
you feeling exhausted both physically and emotionally.
*this is a review of the film at the cinema, home viewing
experience may vary.
