I love classic literature. There was even a period of my life in which I
mostly read and collect classic literature.
But there is one of these novels that I admit I can’t seem to like at
all: Moby-Dick; or, The Whale by
Herman Melville. It’s an iconic story
and is considered a Great American Novel, but I really find the book itself to
be boring. I didn’t even finish it. Either I’m not sophisticated enough to enjoy
it, or it’s really a pretentious novel, as I believe it is. I’d rather struggle through Shakespeare than
read Moby-Dick (at least, with
Shakespearean literature, it’s pretty rewarding once you finally grasp it).
In the Heart of the Sea is an adaptation of the non-fiction book of
the same name by Nathaniel Philbrick, which is about the real-life incident
that inspired Melville to write Moby-Dick. The movie tells the story of the crew of the
whaling ship Essex as they undergo a horrific
voyage for survival after their ship is sunk by a colossal, vengeful white
sperm whale and are left adrift in the ocean.
I personally find In the Heart of the Sea as pretentious
as Moby-Dick. It aspires to be profound and epic, and it
does have the potential to be so, but the execution felt really messy. The characters are so dull and infuriating
that I wished the whale killed them all.
And though there were moments and aspects that I liked – especially when
the whales are around – these were quite few and weren’t stressed enough. I was yawning all throughout this movie.
In the Heart of the Sea is a forgettable, insipid movie that fails
in achieving the heights it was obviously aiming for.
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