In The Heart Of The Sea ★★

Thor Vs The Whale.

I’ve never read Moby Dick. It wasn’t part of the school curriculum and I’ve never felt a particular urge to seek it out myself. As good as the book might be, ‘In The Heart Of The Sea’ has done it little favours.

It’s 1820-ish and a whaling crew, including Chris Hemsworth as Owen Chase and Cillian Murphy as Matthew Joy, go out to hunt the giant beasts for their oil. They don’t do very well and end up heading further into the sea, until they encounter the giant, fabled white whale known (since) for fighting back. The story is told by surviving member Tom Nickerson (Brendan Gleeson) to the author of the best-selling novel, Herman Melville (Ben Whishaw).

Unfortunately none of the characters are all that engaging, partly because Tom Nickerson is mentioned (spoiler: inaccurately) as the only surviving crew member from the start, and partly because they all seem expendable. You want Chase to get home to his wife, but it wouldn’t tug on your heartstrings too much if he didn’t. And you know that at least Nickerson gets back home, because the film is in flashback sequence.

The whale itself is probably the most interesting character, though it swings between melodramatic anthropomorphism and animalistic rage. And after all the previous whaling efforts it’s difficult not to root for it. There’s so much gusto in the crew when they’re hunting their first whale, and then a painfully thoughtful moment once it’s dead. It feels a bit artificial, as if somebody thought they had to reiterate that whaling is bad to a modern audience.

The scenes with the whale are definitely the most enjoyable, save for one scene where the ship sails into a storm. But that just means that the film’s main strength is in destruction porn: the joy in seeing a ship torn apart but some giant, destructive force. The CGI is impressive enough, though at times it does verge on Zack Snyder’s worst offerings and the 3D effect doesn’t help. To the film’s credit, it does create a decent sense of tension, helplessness and drowning. It’s just a shame it’s served in a light patter and not the storm promised.

At the heart of this film is a decent blockbuster, desperate to get out. But, oddly, the scenes of the whale are too few and far between, and there’s too much focus on the crew members without the weight to warrant it. Too much characterless melodrama bogs down an already poor script, turning a potential epic into a floundering carp.