Adrift, the movie

[thomm225]

IMBD rates the movie at 6.6 which means it's a pretty basic movie unless you are way into the material/subject.

The book sounds great though especially since the young lady overcame so much and sailed that beat up, broken down boat 1500 miles alone for 41 days after she lost her fiance

Her mind was a bit messed up from that hit she took on the head.......

[Baba Buoy]

[QUOTE=skipmac;2644395]Yeah, that's me, highbrow. Space Cowboys did succumb a little to Hollywood but was better than most. I still think one of the space movies that got most of the physics and technology right was 2001. Gravity did pretty well although the story line got to be a little much at times.

What got me in giggles in "Gravity", was the actress playing an astronaut was wearing a sports bra the entire movie. In zero gravity. Really?

[CharlzO]

As long as it's better than All Is Lost...

[skipmac]

Originally Posted by Baba Buoy

What got me in giggles in "Gravity", was the actress playing an astronaut was wearing a sports bra the entire movie. In zero gravity. Really?

Well, she had to wear something to avoid an R rating.

[skipmac]

Originally Posted by CharlzO

As long as it's better than All Is Lost...

Unfortunately it doesn't take much to be better than All is Lost.

[FlyingScot]

Pretty good movie. The editing showed two timelines going back and forth between the falling in love and the storm/after the storm.

Nitpicking example:
She appeared to move the anchor onto the rock instead of into the sand. But minor details.

Overall decent sailing movie. But it's a love story.

It's a great advert for EPIRBs.

-Chris

[skipmac]

Originally Posted by FlyingScot

Pretty good movie. The editing showed two timelines going back and forth between the falling in love and the storm/after the storm.

Nitpicking example:
She appeared to move the anchor onto the rock instead of into the sand. But minor details.

Overall decent sailing movie. But it's a love story.

It's a great advert for EPIRBs.

-Chris

All in all I guess I'll have to go see it. If I could live through All is Lost then sounds like this one will be a lot better.

[fivecapes]

Can anyone who read the book or watched the movie cast some light as to why they were unable to detect/avoid/outrun storm please.

Long time lurker, and totally enjoy it.

[El Pinguino]

Originally Posted by fivecapes

Can anyone who read the book or watched the movie cast some light as to why they were unable to detect/avoid/outrun storm please.

Long time lurker, and totally enjoy it.

In the early 1980's we didn't have access to a fraction of the weather information that is available now. Most big ships let alone yachts didn't have the ability to receive wefax..... and few yachts had HF.....

[Neptune's Gear]

I worked on the making of this movie, as a skipper. They didn’t know the storm was there. There is a fair bit of literary licence taken with the facts....

[brookiesailor]

From what I read in the book, the storm was quick forming and kept changing direction. They did try changing course twice to get out of its path but when ever they did it also shifted course.

Like El Penguino said, they were limited to VHF reports.

[PatrickG]

Originally Posted by Neptune's Gear

I worked on the making of this movie, as a skipper. They didn’t know the storm was there. There is a fair bit of literary licence taken with the facts....

Hi Neptune, interesting! I watched the movie yesterday and generally enjoyed it. The whole love story was reasonably well-done and the characters were good. Must have been fun! As a currently land-based former ocean sailor, I was even willing to suffer through the inevitable "if you go to sea you will die in a terrible storm" Hollywood trope for some sweet shots of life on the water. But as always whenever watching any sailing movie, was also thinking "When it costs as much as it does to make a movie like this, why can Hollywood never pay a few thousand for some decent advice on sailing?"

Just some examples (assuming none of these are down to your input but a director who just wouldn't listen

- In the early scene where Richard motors into the harbor on Tahiti he passes a boat smack in the foreground from the 90s at the earliest.

- When they're out in Tahiti with two boats having a nice daysail, both boats' leeches are flapping like crazy. Admittedly not the biggest point, but it makes them look silly at a moment when we're supposed to be believing in their skills (especially Richard's but we're supposed to be learning that Tami's got skillz too).

- At no point when discussing with the boat's owners about the delivery does the subject of weather or season come up. It's just "You want us to go to San Diego, yeah, ok." On the one hand you could say the director wanted to keep it simple for a non-technical audience. But on the other this seemed like a lost storytelling opportunity - a missed chance to foreshadow. I mean, really? No: "Oh ****, that's getting pretty late into hurricane season, I don't know..." The season and the weather would be the very first topic of discussion in that setting - even to dismiss it as "Yeah, we've got at least four months of good weather ahead so we should be just fine."

- They're on a ketch and sail straight into the storm with main and mizzen up on maybe second reef, and no foresail. "Oh my god, we need to get some sail down!" What ketch sailor would ever have that configuration? She would be completely unbalanced. If they wanted to heave to, mizzen alone could be an option, but they don't seem to be doing that. And no mention of a storm headsail or trysail. At this point I was slapping myself in the face and at the same time saying "what do you expect? Hollywood+sailing." Again, all this could seem pedantic, but as a sailor it's hard not to lose the pathos especially for Richard. Which is too bad because otherwise it's a nice-ish story and with just a few incredibly inexpensive changes that stuff could have been fixed too.

- Richard also seems to have absolutely no storm strategy. I mean, even for that time: trailing warps, or even dumping some oil on the water or whatever. He doesn't seem to have heard of heaving to. I suppose in those days that lying ahull was also common, but doesn't seem to have been contemplated either. There's some mention of turning presumably to run off, but good luck trying that with the current sail plan guys. In the meantime, Richard just just grips the wheel like a deer in the headlights, which, see pathos above.

- One of my favorite laughs in the movie is when, at sea in the Pacific, Richard listens to a weather report (aka "exposition" aka "storm clouds on the horizon dear character") and the report is directed to "sailors in the Pacific". I mean, it's a report for basically the entire ocean, and the message is "watch out guys, a storm is headed your way!" Facepalm. Again, why treat the audience like idiots? Take the time to make it understandable AND technically accurate and the same scene would be so much stronger and not make Richard look like a dip.

- There were more things during the post-disaster aftermath, but fair enough to chalk those up to "who knows what one would really do when exhausted and terrified and drifting in the middle of the Pacific." The real life Tami obviously did a brilliant job and well done to her for surviving.

- But then comes the very end: uplifting flashback to anchoring in Tahiti. And here comes Tami to lift their anchor from the bottom -- where it lies perfectly peacefully in the sand, though it needs to be dug in -- and carries it over to hook it on a bommie and I'm like, "yeah, perfect. I deserve this: I bought the ticket after all." Laughs

[gulfbreez]

You mean the 1989 Movie Adrift? I have watched it a few times, the cabin seems huge, of course that is just for the camera.I gave it 9 out 10. pretty good movie. The other one is dead calm. And there is another movie but I forgot the name, its like a mother father and 5 kids, and their tale of being stuck on a life raft for days, and they have to eat raw fish n all that. Forgot the name

[PatrickG]

Originally Posted by gulfbreez

You mean the 1989 Movie Adrift? I have watched it a few times, the cabin seems huge, of course that is just for the camera.I gave it 9 out 10. pretty good movie. The other one is dead calm. And there is another movie but I forgot the name, its like a mother father and 5 kids, and their tale of being stuck on a life raft for days, and they have to eat raw fish n all that. Forgot the name

Hi Gulfbreez, no there's a new one out - in theaters now

[PatrickG]

In my earlier post I said that anachronistic boat (check it out here: https://goo.gl/images/JMw93d - in this shot it's in the background, but in one of the first shots of the film it's right in the foreground) was possibly from the nineties - but I found a picture and actually it looks like a Jeanneau, with a bow angle they didn't adopt until 2004. I know I know, who cares?

It's just that no self-respecting director or DP doing a period movie would EVER set a street shot up with authentic period cars and then accept a 20 year newer car right in the middle of their shot. But with boats, it doesn't seem to matter. And you have to think they would at least like water-interested people to show up and watch their movies - why make such a simple mistake?