Review – The Wave (2015)
Everyone seems to be talking about how this is a standard Hollywood disaster film. I can see where they are coming from. The Wave does check all of the genre / convention boxes. Passionate leading man that knows of pending doom, check. Everyone around him thinks he is an alarmist and disregards his warnings, check. Protagonist is having difficulty with his family (step-kids work even better), check. A “beat-the-clock” situation where we only have a very limited time to save the lives of the innocent, check. The list goes on and on.
The disaster here is small in scale compared to movies like 2012 or The Day After Tomorrow, it is still very much a life and death type of disaster for the people involved. It makes the film personal and invests the audience more in the pilot of the characters. We spend a lot of time getting to know the family and the co-workers of the protagonist. We understand him as a man, and a father, husband, step-father, and passionate scientist. This isn’t just killing time until the event, this is real character development.
Overall, The Wave is a high stakes disaster movie that put’s a lot of bigger budget efforts to shame, a truly gripping movie that had me on the edge of my seat for the whole second half, well worth checking out.
No extras unfortunately, I would have loved to see a VFX breakdown or at least a making of. The transfer it top rate though, shows off the gorgeous scenery and the incredible effects brilliantly.
Action, Drama, Thriller | Norway, 2015 | 15 | Studiocanal | 15th August 2016 (UK) | Dir. Roar Uthaug | Kristoffer Joner, Ane Dahl Torp, Fridtjob Såheim | Buy: [Blu-ray]
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