The Finest Hours

The FINEST HOURS is a rip-roaring, edge of your seat action thriller that will keep you guessing all the way to the end.

There....that should get me on the poster.

That said, I will have to admit that I had low to middling expectations going into this film and it exceeded my expectation in almost every way.

Starting with the Cast. Chris Pine (good ol' Cap't Kirk) stars as Bernie Webber a mid-level Coast Guard officer who is flung into the forefront when an oil barge splits in half in very rough sees during a storm. Pine presents Webber not as a square-jawed hero, but a real person with doubts and insecurities but a strict code of ethics and when his Capt. (the always capable Eric Bana) sends him out for what could be a suicide mission, he goes out.

While Pine holds down half of this movie, Casey Affleck holds down the other half as the leader of the group of survivors on the oil tanker. Normally, I am not a big fan of Affleck's work, but in this movie, I sure am. He is a man of few words and tells much with his expression. If there is a "squared jawed hero" in this movie, it is Affleck.

These two are supported by a veritable who's who of "that guy" actors. Ben Foster, John Ortiz, Michael Raymond James and good ol' Abraham Benrubi are just the tip of the iceberg, so to speak, of wonderful character actors filling the roles of other Coast Guard members and crewmen of the doomed ship.

Only Holliday Grainger as Pine's strong-willed fiancé fails for me, but I blame a weak written character more than her acting for that one.

But, make no mistake, it is the action that makes this movie exciting. From the opening where the oil ship splits in half through the attempt to get out to the ocean to find the doomed ship to the actual rescue itself, I was on pins and needles, literally vaulting myself up out of my seat to get over a wave at one point. Director Craig Gillespie, not known as an action director, does a nice job of leading us through these scenes, I am anxious to see what he takes on next. I hope it is another action flick.

Is it a great film? No. The opening (after the tanker accident) drags and the movie bounces around in tone trying to find out what kind of movie it wants to be, but once Pine and company goes out to sea to rescue, the movie zips along just fine.

7 (out of 10) stars and you can take that to the Bank (of Marquis)

So, this movie was an old fashioned feel-good, heroes-save-the-day, morality driven drama. I loved it for that. So many films of our era are overly laced with cynicism and violence. Finest Hours hearkens back to the Frank Capra style of story telling, when we had protangonists like Jimmy Stewart and Henry Fonda to make us feel good about being human. I'm a fan of that genre; it's not passe, we need more of it. Kudos to the makers of this film for showing us something fine and upstanding for a change. Hollywood, take a cue here. No more Dark Knights, okay? Just decent, good hearted heroism like the kind found here.

This movie has a lot of action and suspense, which is what many of us look for in a film. However, it is much more than a story of an event at sea, it is a testimony of what four men of the US Coast Guard in the '50s were willing to do despite the risk to their lives.

A full scale nor'easter stirred the waters of Massechusetts Bay, making the seas dangerously life threatening. Word by two-way radio of vessels being damaged and broken from the force of the waves demanded the local Coast Guard Commander send his men to rescue who they could.

Reluctant, initially, to respond to such a perilous task, to rescue men that may still be alive aboard one sinking vessel, the Pendleton, Boatwainsmate Bernard Webber gathered three volunteer sailors to assist him. The freezing snow, winds, rain and treacherous waters were certainly more than he and his men bargained for when they enlisted.

Webber took the helm of the craft, the size of which could barely hold him and his three man crew through fifty and sixty feet waves, finally reaching, purely by luck, the darkened liner, a 503 foot, 10.448 gross ton tank vessel that, at its start, contained a full cargo of kerosene and heating oil.

Tactics used to keep the Pendleton from sinking are a lesson to watch. During today's rescue efforts, it is the CG's option to use a helicopter for such undertakings, but when the numbers are as many as these survivors, I doubt one trip would end with Webber's results.

The bravery and single-mindedness needed to accomplish what these four men sought to do makes me very proud to know our country has such heroic individuals willing to give their lives to save complete strangers.

February 1952. Bernie Webber is a boatswain/Petty Officer at a Coast Guard station on the coast of Massachusetts. A massive storm is in progress out to sea, damaging two tankers to the point that they appear likely to sink. On one tanker, the Pendleton, the chief engineer, Ray Sybert, is using all his ingenuity, resourcefulness and experience to keep the ship afloat and buy time until help arrives. Unfortunately for him and his crew, the Coast Guard have sent their best crew and rescue boat to the other stricken tanker. When the Coast Guard discover the Pendleton's situation, Webber and a 3-man crew are sent to help. The odds are stacked against Webber - just leaving the harbour in those seas will require large amounts of skill, courage and luck. Then they have to find the Pendleton, without a compass, rescue the crew and somehow make it home safe.

An enthralling (true) story of courage and survival. Compelling viewing - once the danger strikes, you're glued to your seat. What makes it so interesting is that they don't just focus on the efforts of the rescuers but also on the rescued. I found the Pendleton crew's story much more interesting than that of Webber and co - the ingenuity, resourcefulness and (reluctant) leadership of Sybert was amazing. This is helped by a great performance from Casey Affleck.

Not all good though. Many of the characters seem like cartoon stereotypes - the negative naysayers, the clingy girlfriend/fiancée, the inept commander. The romantic angle was overplayed and not that necessary. It did add depth to Webber's character but not much.

Performances vary. Casey Affleck is the stand-out as Sybert. Chris Pine is okay as Webber. Eric Bana is pretty weak and gives the worst American accent I've ever heard (I think it was supposed to be Southern but it varied so much and seemed so unnatural it was hard to tell). Holliday Grainger is a bit overbearing as Miriam, though that might have been intentional on the director's part.

In 1950, in Cape Cod in Massachusetts, the US Coast Guard station in Chatham receives a distress signal from the oil tankers SS Pendleton and SS Fort Mercer. Commander Daniel Cluff (Eric Bana) assigns the crew formed by Bernie Webber (Chris Pine), Richard Livesey (Ben Foster), Andy Fitzgerald (Kyle Gallner) and Ervin Maske (John Magaro) to rescue the crew of the SS Pendleton in a small enclosed lifeboat. Cluff is warned about the intensity of the storm by Bernie and also by his girlfriend Miriam (Holliday Grainger) but he keeps the order. Meanwhile the SS Pendleton has broken and lost his forward part and his skilled and experienced engineer Ray Sybert (Casey Affleck) assumes the command of the survivors. He uses his abilities to steer the stern in a safer position, grounding it on an unstable bank of sand to avoid sinking.

"The Finest Hours" is based on the most daring rescue of a crew in a blizzard with a small enclosed lifeboat-rescue boat. The heroic work of the US Coast Guard crew is impressive, saving thirty-two survivors from the SS Pendleton. The ability of the engineer Ray Sybert is also praiseworthy. The film is technically impressive with breathtaking action scenes of the rescue operation. The romance is silly and only completes the running time. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "Horas Decisivas" ("Decisive Hours")