Talk about misleading marketing, “”Master and Commander”” is a boring, two hour plus film that is disguised as an good old fashion “”Swashbuckler.”” Being a huge fan of sword play, and high seas adventure, I was holding out hope that “”Master and Commander”” would be that film that I could walk out of the theater screaming “”Now that’s a worthy ‘Best Picture Contender.”” Instead, what I got was a film that opens with a fantastic five minute battle sequence and then just limps along for another two hours.
Based on the popular Patrick O’Brian book series (I’ll be honest, I’ve never even heard of this guy). Set against the backdrop of the early 18th century, Napoleon Wars; “”Master and Commander”” is supposedly about the relationship between the Captain of the “”Good Ship Lollipop,”” a.k.a. “”The HMS Surprise””, “”Lucky Jack”” Aubrey (Russell Crowe), and his best friend, the ship’s surgeon, Stephen Maturin (EM Favorite Paul Bettany). There’s not much more plot to this film than that. Sure we can talk about the fact that there’s this Phantom ship that keeps popping up out of nowhere, but what’s the point since the story doesn’t tell us ANYTHING about the crew of that ship, and basically 85 percent of the film is spent on everything other than the fact that this ship is chasing them. Do we get to see them prepare for battle? Well, sort of. We get a scene at the end where Jack and Company put their plan together, and we get to see the crew prepare for battle, this lasts all of five, maybe ten minutes. What kind of fighters are these when every time they see the much bigger, faster ship, they “”Hoist those sails”” and run away? We get about four or five of these moments – “”How did that ship find us? Can we catch a good wind? Yeah, ‘Hoist the Sails.’ Run, run…””But most of the time we get shots of Jack, Stephen, and the rest of the crew’s officers (which include 13 year old “”kids””) sitting around a table, drinking, telling jokes (that only Sailors get) and good god, SINGING!! Yes folks: that’s the entire movie, scene after boring scene, after boring scene, of them sitting around the table in the officer’s quarters singing and talking. Oh, and that’s broken up by a nature trip to the Gallipolis Islands! It’s time for me to be honest here, I didn’t walk out of this film, but I did fall asleep for 20 minutes.The film is competently made, the fact that the studio actually built a real ship really adds to the realism of the piece. The acting ran the gamut from good to really good. Crowe was ok in this, but I admit, that I don’t like his acting style and just don’t get the love affair everyone has with him, if he sits on a crapper and read a newspaper Critics will fawn over him and nominate him for an Oscar. Paul Bettany wasn’t given much to work with here; this isn’t the role that will turn him into a top star. The folks who really had nice meaty parts were the kids on the ship, specifically Max Pirkis as the young 13 year old midshipman Blakeney, who has to become a leader of his crew of much older sea men, really steals this movie. Peter Weir’s directing is competent, but there’s no pizzazz to it. The main problem with “”Master and Commander”” is, that there is no there, there. This is a movie about moments, setting a mood, and characters. It tries so hard, too hard, to get us to care about these people and their situation, without really explaining why we should care what goes on. Hey, it’s time for another song and story!””Master and Commander”” is yet another big budgeted “”action”” film that manages to be even more disappointingly bland, boring, and overblown then most of this year’s crop of films. It’s not that “”Master”” is necessarily a bad film, it’s stylishly made, well acted, good direction, but it just commits the ultimate sin of being “”blah.”” There’s a whole lot of “”Swash”” but very little “”Buckling.””Final Grade C- EM Review byMichelle AlexandriaOriginally Posted 11/14/03