Made on a six-million-euro budget, the Norwegian drama has stunning digital effects and mise en scene
Points: 8
First of all, the wave is awesome. More to the point, it’s a tsunami created by a major rockslide which crashes into the fjord and produces a huge wall of water that wipes out almost an entire Norwegian mountain village. Among those trying to survive, there’s a family of four: a geologist working at a warning centre, his wife who’s a hotel employee, their average skateboarding teenage son, and a cute little girl. There are others, of course, most of which will die rather sooner than later.
Once the cataclysm starts to take place, people will only have 10 freaking minutes to run to the highest possible area in the mountain. And to think the people in charge of keeping an eye on the mountain had had early signs of the mayhem to come —as usual.
Roar Uthaug’s The Wave is Scandinavia’s first disaster movie, as well as last year’s submission for the Best Foreign Language film to the Academy Awards. It’s based on events that occurred decades ago and it draws a possible scenario for the years to come since experts agree that considering the number of shaky mountains in Norway, it’s just a matter of time until something like this takes place. Whether such assessment is true or not is of little importance, for what matters is that as you watch the film, you are likely to feel it can actually happen.
Geiranger is the name of the fjord. Leading Norwegian actors Kristoffer Joner and Ane Dahl Torp play Kristian Eikford and Idun —husband and wife —whereas Jonas Hoff Oftebro is Sondre, the teenage son, and Edith Haagenrud-Sande Julia, the young daughter. Though not fully fleshed out, their characters still are developed enough for a breathtaking thriller that adheres to the most common traits of the genre. And while it’s a cinch that J.A. Bayona’s The Impossible, which focuses on the aftermath of the impact of a tsunami, will come to mind while watching The Wave, it’s equally true that both movies are different in some key aspects.
The Impossible is a disaster movie in a melodramatic key almost from beginning to end. The Norwegian feature is more of a realistic drama, if you will. In this sense, it’s easier and way more disturbing to relate to the characters in The Wave. Broadly speaking, human tragedy works better when you feel close to recognizable individuals. The sequence where Kristian tries to make sense of the devastation left by the tsunami while he desperately searches for his daughter is particularly striking. And so are Idun’s efforts to find her son who’s somewhere in the hotel where she works, right before the immediate impact of the wave.
Also, except for the impact of the tsunami, unlike in The Impossible, here gripping suspense takes the place of grand spectacle in most of the movie. But perhaps it takes too long in setting up the very moment of the disaster —a little over an hour seems too much. Even more so when you have some 40 minutes until the end for the entire struggle to try to survive to unfold. That’s the main reason why you may feel you’ve been somehow shortchanged. Which still doesn’t prevent the movie from being better than most Hollywood disaster movies, which almost solely rely on never-ending digital effects, which end up being sort of boring.
The Wave was made on a budget of six million euros but it doesn’t show. You’d think more money was put into the film, all the more so when the digital effects and the overall mise en scene are so stunning. Yet these special effects are used strictly when needed and for a brief amount of time —e.g. when the tsunami slams into the village— from different points of view. Other than that, the rest is the somewhat strong human drama.
On the minus side, towards the ending The Wave goes Hollywood, right when you’d think it would challenge viewers with a more unsettling ending. With more darkness, that is. This is a moderate disappointment because up to that very moment, Roar Uthaug’s movie could’ve strongly set itself apart from others of this type. That doesn’t mean it’s not very good entertainment. For sure, it is.
Production notes
The Wave (Bolgen, Norway, 2015). Directed by Roar Uthaug. Written by John Kare Raake, Harald Rosenlow Eeg. With Kristoffer Joner, Ane Dahl Torp, Jonas Oftebro. Cinematographer: John Cristian Rosenlund. Production designer: Nina Nordqvist Music: Magnus Beite. Editor: Christian Siebenherz. Production company: Fantefilm Fiksjon. Running time: 105 minutes.
