The Deep | Little White Lies

The Deep

12 Jul 2013 / Released: 12 Jul 2013

Two people wearing lifejackets in rough water.
Two people wearing lifejackets in rough water.
2

Anticipation.

Sounds grim and a little colourless.

3

Enjoyment.

The might and splendour of raging elements rolls high, then crash into noise.

4

In Retrospect.

Shows pervading and wise humility in the face of nature.

A noirish Ice­landic agains-all-odds sur­vival dra­ma about a man who swims away from an epic shipwreck.

When in 1984 his fish­ing ship Hellisey VE-503 sank and crew­mates died rapid­ly in the unbear­ably cold water, Guðlau­gur Gul­li’ Friðþórs­son swam five miles to land, tra­versed vol­canic glass in bare feet then col­lapsed at the first house he found. His strange vic­to­ry over the ele­ments puz­zles long after the con­clu­sion of Bal­tasar Kormákur’s strik­ing but clut­tered eighth fea­ture, based on this strange real event.

As in Kormákur’s blood-splat­tered detec­tive yarn, Jar City, the stark cli­mate of Heimaey, an island off the south coast of Ice­land, is cap­tured with bleak, almost noirish visu­als. The black of the night sea con­trasts with snowy land­scapes, with grey dom­i­nat­ing the estab­lish­ing scenes as, pre-fish­ing trip, the crew go drink­ing on a night that makes Ray­mond Chandler’s seamy under­world look as vibrant as Spring Breakers.

While his visu­als are strik­ing, Kor­mákur fails to trust in the sim­ple pow­er of his source mate­r­i­al, employ­ing var­i­ous dis­trac­tions that irri­tate rather than enhance. His sto­ry­telling con­tains too much padding, music plays dur­ing scenes that are strong enough to stand silent­ly and the third-act dia­logue, as baf­fled sci­en­tists inves­ti­gate how Gul­li sur­vived, is as clunky as a slap­dash TV pro­ce­dur­al. Yet — like its hero — the film still man­ages against the odds to hold the attention.

This is large­ly because of the lead, Óla­fur Dar­ri Ólaf­s­son, who turns in a grace­ful and eco­nom­ic per­for­mance. His Gul­li, with stocky frame and fond­ness for checked shirts, is capa­ble and unfussy, built for a life of small man­u­al suc­cess­es. When he dis­cov­ers super­hu­man sur­vival abil­i­ty, it sits uncom­fort­ably in his hum­ble self-perception.

His awe is syn­chro­nised with the per­spec­tive that ele­vates The Deep above its imper­fec­tions. A crane shot of Gul­li dog­gy-pad­dling through the ocean pulls back­wards until he is tiny. This shot is as exis­ten­tial­ly crys­talline as the Auden line: Look­ing up at the stars, I know quite well. That, for all they care, I could go to hell.”

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