Directed by: Wolfgang Petersen
Cast: Kurt Russell, Josh Lucas, Richard Dreyfuss, & Andre Braugher
Runtime: 99 min.
Rating: PG-13
Trailer

A luxury cruise ship carrying thousands of passengers is slammed by a giant “rogue” wave that turns the ship on its side and upside down. With hundreds of passengers killed in the initial onslaught, some of the survivors seal themselves in the main ballroom waiting for a rescue that they believe will surely arrive. Yet a small group of heroic go-getters covering the breadth of American ethnic, religious, racial lines band together in hopes of finding another way out of the ship before it completely disappears underwater. With this remake of The Poseidon Adventure, Wolfgang Petersen claims to have finally finished his long awaited water trilogy. Starting with the submarine disaster epic, Das Boot, to the bloated The Perfect Storm, and finally to Poseidon, one thing viewers will invariably notice is the obvious increase in budget and the sharp decline in quality.

Let’s meet the heroes that make up this newest version, shall we? I am sure you have all met them somewhere in another movie. There is Dylan (Josh Lucas), the mysterious, suave, and heroic gambler who simply bats his eyes and women swoon, especially Maggie (Jacinda Barret) – a single mother who takes instructions from her precocious and idiotic son, Conor (Jimmy Bennet) – and Elena (Mía Maestro), the Hispanic stowaway who’s heading to New York to visit her dying brother…or was it cousin…?

Bringing up the rear is one-time firefighter and New York City mayor, Robert Ramsay (Kurt Russell), who is worried that his little girl, Jennifer (Emmy Rossum), is growing up too fast. Shouldn’t he know that his daughter is only a plot device used to show character growth, like when he reluctantly acknowledges his daughter’s transformation into a woman through her newfound cleavage? And of course, a disaster picture isn’t complete without the just-because-I-can baddie, Lucky Larry (Kevin Dillon, proving that his brother, Matt, lucked out in the acting department), and lest we forget, the weak sister of the bunch, Richard Nelson (Richard Dreyfuss), the token homosexual.

Poseidon is all wet, to be sure, but that does not mean it is a complete failure and it’s sure as hell not one of the worst movies ever made. No, that prize arguably belongs to movies like X-Men: The Last Stand. The film plays out like a slower, less inspired version of Speed, but where that had interesting characters and clear narrative direction from Jan De Bont, Wolfgang Petersen’s direction forgets to orient the audience. Is the ship upside down, sideways, sinking, or is it the Titanic?

Petersen is a capable director and is usually at home with claustrophobic settings, but at the risk of sounding redundant, I can’t stress how confusing and illogical the characters’ escape plays out. Petersen refuses to highlight where the characters are in regards to the ship as a whole. He had many opportunities, considering the opening shot is an impressive one-take (albeit CGI) dolly shot following Dylan jogging around the ship towards the top deck, giving the viewer a sense of order, structure, and clarity of the ship’s exterior. However, in case anyone forgot, almost the entire film takes place inside the ship’s many nooks and crannies, leaving the audience oblivious to the location.

At least in Titanic, James Cameron created a simulated destruction of the ship during the opening flashback. He established a timeline and order of events that gave the audience an opportunity to not only familiarize themselves with the location, but gave access to more information than what the characters knew – an essential element in creating suspense. Poseidon’s omission of any sort spatial understanding of the environment is a real loss, and yet, its energy and pacing rescue the waterlogged film despite its glaring flaws.

It doesn’t take itself too seriously, so it’s okay to cut the film’s misfires some slack. It’s like that kid in the back of class who tries hard to tell a good story, but ends up speeding through it so fast you miss half of it while you’re busy scrambling for your bearings. That or he just pees his pants.

Richard X
© Cinephile Magazine, 2006