THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA: a review of "All Is Lost"

"ALL IS LOST"
Written and Directed by J.C. Chandor
** (two stars)

It will never cease to confound me about the hows and whens of some films, especially ones that are completely similar in tone, concepts and themes, will either work or not work, reach me or leave me wholly dispassionate.

In the space of one month, I have seen two visually ambitious, creatively and thematically complex survival drama films. Yet, where one film, in this case Director Alfonso Cuaron's "Gravity," has sailed to being one of the finest films of 2013, the other film, "All Is Lost," the second film from Writer/Director J.C. Chandor, has somehow left me feeling uninvolved and empty. Simply an odd feeling to have as there is truly nothing wrong with the film (aside from perhaps the final moments). Like "Gravity," this film places you in the terrifying company of one character desperately attempting to survive in an un-survivable locale in increasingly desperate circumstances. It is also a challenging piece of filmmaking that features Robert Redford as the film's sole actor as an unnamed character in a movie which contains virtually no dialogue at all. And yet, I found my mind wandering often, unable to connect to what I was viewing in any sense of a white knuckle fashion. Oddly enough, I do not wish for you to take my words as a means to stay away from this film because, and please do believe me, this film may quite possibly reach you in a way and with a power that it did not reach for me. And besides that, I strongly feel that films like this, which are a tad left of center should be experienced and supported That said, and for me and my sensibilities, "All Is Lost" was not nearly as compelling for me as I truly believe that J.C. Chandor and Robert Redford wished for it to be.   

Known in the film's credits only as "Our Man," Robert Redford stars in "All Is Lost," as an amateur sailor adrift in the waters somewhere in the Indian Ocean. As the film opens, our unnamed hero is awakened by the harsh sound of the hull of his boat, named the "Virginia Jean," being punctured open by a wayward shipping container. Finding water pouring into his boat, he springs into action to re-seal the hull and excise the rising water from the inside of the boat. While embarking upon his repairs, Our Man discovers that his navigational and communication equipment have been severely damaged from the crash and soon thereafter, he in plunged into an eight day nautical nightmare where he is forced to fight for his life within two storms, the loss of the Virginia Jean (where he is then additionally forced to sail in a tiny lifeboat), a school of sharks, a contaminated water supply, and no signs of life anywhere at all.    

Now, as you can see, "All Is Lost" sounds like a really good nail biter and the conceptual comparisons to the closely released "Gravity" would seem to make this an excellent companion film to view. However, the film was not what I had hoped for it to be. My issues with "All is Lost" have considerably much less to do with its presentation and considerably much more to do with my reaction to it. There is no question that J. C. Chandor has created an impressively helmed feature and that he is obviously attempting to strike for cinematic gold on his second time at bat. "All is Lost" is a crisp and cleanly told thriller that is confident in its visual storytelling. Furthermore, Robert Redford is equally impressive with this physically (reportedly the 77 year old actor performed the lion's share of his own stunts) and psychologically demanding role that proves that he is not simply going to settle for coasting upon his unquestionable film legend. In fact, any attention during awards season that Redford is bound to attract will not be disputed in any way by me as every bit of it is well deserved. It truly is a Master Class in acting as Redford shows so effortlessly how much and more impressively, how very little he has to do (especially without the power of his own voice) in conveying the film's deeply complex themes and meditations about death and our human desire and capacity to survive even when all options in doing so are rapidly running out.

And yet, I was unmoved.

Perhaps my disconnection to "All Is Lost" was due to the film's highly effective and unfortunately, spoiler ridden trailer which in indeed another symptom of film trailers being more effective movies than the actual film that it is advertising. Trust me, if you happen to view the trailer to this film on-line, you have essentially seen the entire film in a drastically truncated running time. Nearly every single beat and predicament our unnamed hero faces in the Indian Ocean is on display and as many times as I have seen the trailer over the last few months in theaters, I do have to say that white knuckle desperation has appeared again and again. But with the full, finished film however...it seemed as if I was watching a two hour version of the trailer in that I was just waiting and waiting for all of the highlights to occur. Now, this is indeed not Chandor's fault by any means but it does indeed illustrate a major problem with film advertising in the sense that too much is being shown, and therefore, no mystery remains which makes for a movie that is underwhelming through no fault of its own. The trailers for "Gravity" however showed just enough, making you salivate in anticipation just wondering what could possibly happen next and wondering just where a film like that could possibly go. But even so, I watched those trailers for "Gravity" over and over in awe and terror and even seeing those trailer so many times did not diminish the overall power of that film in the least.
  
But even if you took the trailer out of the equation, for whatever reasons, I just could not help but to keep mentally returning to "Gravity" and how emotionally exhausting and even physically draining of an experience it was in comparison to the very similarly themed and conceived "All is Lost." And besides, a film has to be able to be successful completely independent of its trailer anyway. Just what was it about Alfonso Cuaron's visual storytelling that captured that pinpoint sense of primal fear which conjured up the sensation of losing my oxygen right alongside Sandra Bullock, the panic, shock and awe with every single perilous predicament that seemed to snuff of her character's life at any given moment? Even now, I can still think of that one shot where her body is spiraling end over end further and further into the vast blackness of space and the hairs on the back of my neck rise at the mere thought of being so lost, so un-tethered, so helpless and so doomed. And yet, as I watched "All is Lost," never did I once feel any similar sense of danger or life threatening pathos.

But let's go even one step further. Let's take "Gravity" completely out of the mix also. Let's think about other films that pit human against the simultaneously breathtaking and unforgiving backdrop of the natural world and its elements like Robert Zemeckis' "Cast Away" (2000), Sean Penn's "Into The Wild" (2007), Danny Boyle's "127 Hours" (2010) or even classics like James Cameron's "The Abyss" (1989) and "Titanic" (1997) and most certainly, Steven Spielberg's "Jaws" (1975). But, truth be told, those are all the cinematic "big guns." So, how about the comparatively tiny budgeted "Open Water" (2003) from Writer/Director Chris Kentis instead? Or even the infuriatingly self-congratulatory but somehow mesmerizing "Gerry" (2002) from Gus Van Sant? In all of those films, there is just that je ne sais quoi, that certain something in the cinematic storytelling that is so aggressively powerful and palpable that I am nearly able to forget that I am sitting in a movie theater or in the comfort of my own home that transcends mere movie viewing and becomes experiences where I am able to sit within the pit of my own deepest fears and questions of survival, life and mortality directly alongside the main protagonists. With "All Is Lost," I knew that was the effect J.C. Chandor was going for. I knew those particular emotions were precisely what he hoped to elicit from viewers. And while I would not be surprised if his tactics and techniques would work for many of you, for me, it all seemed as if he had all of the notes but somehow did not understand how to play the music, so to speak.

And then, there is indeed the film's ending, of which I will, of course, not reveal but I will tell you is apparently causing some level of debate among audience members (including the very one I saw it with). It is an ending that is needlessly ambiguous and for me, felt to be a complete cop out when placed against the finality of everything we had already seen over the duration of the the film. Those final two minutes or so of "All Is Lost" felt to be so disingenuous, so shoe-horned, and so phony to say the least and it depleted everything that came before them in my eyes.

And so it goes.

Dear readers, please do not let my words deter you from seeing "All is Lost." As previously stated, you just may have the experience J.C. Chandor intended for us to have but somehow eluded me. Or maybe, you will feel as I did with my assessments and if so, perhaps you will also ponder that the only thing that was lost by the end of this film was your money.

Let me know...