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The Wave - Released in the US on Netflix - a fine disaster film from Norway
I generally avoid disaster films unless I’m in a mood that’s only slightly more elevated than when I’m watching professional wrestling. In general, these movies are contrived, stereotyped, predictable exercises in digital FX making. What it would look like if an asteroid hit the earth, or if some idiot recreated dinosaurs, the ultimate “Category 12” hurricane, or a swarm of flaming tornadoes hit Manhattan, are the usual grist of these movies.
In the case of The Wave, however, it’s a real disaster that has happened. Part of my family is Norwegian, and I grew up with folk tales about giant waves that wiped out towns in remote fjord regions. It turns out that this is true and has been happened several times in recent history. What happens is that a part of a mountain that borders a fjord cracks away, slides into the water and generates a huge splash. As the wave from the splash travels up the narrowing waterway, the height is amplified. The resulting wave can be far higher than an earthquake tsunami and wipes out anything in its path. That’s the plot of The Wave. This movie was the most popular movie in Norway back in 2015, won some awards there as well as being nominated for several American awards.
It’s a normal day in Norway (cold and gray that is) when a geologist, Kristian Eikjord, starts his day. He has gotten a better job with an oil company. He and his family will be moving so he’s finishing on his current job, which is monitoring vulnerable mountains that sit next to fjords. Being a movie of this type, you know that things are going to go downhill (in more ways than one) pretty soon. In this case, he wants to move on to his new job, but notices that changes are occurring in the mountain and, being a dedicated guy, he alerts colleagues and authorities. They are skeptical about setting off an alert system that triggers evacuations, but they look at his evidence and are convinced….something real bad is about to happen. Alerts are triggered, evacuations begin and once the mountain starts to slide, the best guess is that they have about 10 minutes before the wave hits a small tourist town and hotel that are right on the waterfront. Kristian is a good parent, gathers his kids and alerts his wife, who works in the tourist hotel. She, in turn, is responsible for alerting hotel guests and doing what is needed to get them out of the way. The wave hits the town. It’s a huge disaster, followed by a search for survivors.
If you’ve seen disaster movies before, you can probably guess at the rest of the story. There’s not much original in that. What is different about The Wave, however, is just how sincere the movie seems. It doesn’t have all of the usual contrived “Hollywood” characters that populate these movies. The characters all seem like real people, confronted with a terrible situation that threatens their lives. There’s none of the usual callous authority figures that generally play into these movies as villains. Everybody in town knows that this can happen, wished that it would not happen during their lives, but now they have to deal with it within minutes. The fact that the disaster happens so quickly means that there really isn’t much to be done except run or drive as fast as you can uphill. The movie runs a little under 2 hours, is very compact, gets right down to business and doesn’t relent until the end. By the time it is over, you might be breathless.
I won’t list out the cast, characters and director, since none of them seem to be known outside of the land of the Vikings, but they are all quite good. The Wave has none of the stupidity that generally afflicts these sort of movies, plays it straight and is very believable. The Wave is in Norwegian, has subtitles, but, for the most part, you don’t need them. Aside from some of the science at the beginning of the film, it’s mainly action oriented. Dialog is minimal, mostly being screams, pleas for help, and some surprising expletives, rendered in American English, that require no subtitles.
I didn’t set out to watch this film, but being completely overdosed on stupid convention politics that were dominating TV that night, I checked on Netflix and saw this as a recommended movie. I actually didn’t even mean to watch the whole thing, but became riveted. It’s probably the best disaster movie I’ve seen in recent years, is mostly believable, never stupid and quite worth watching if you’re in the mood.
I generally avoid disaster films unless I’m in a mood that’s only slightly more elevated than when I’m watching professional wrestling. In general, these movies are contrived, stereotyped, predictable exercises in digital FX making. What it would look like if an asteroid hit the earth, or if some idiot recreated dinosaurs, the ultimate “Category 12” hurricane, or a swarm of flaming tornadoes hit Manhattan, are the usual grist of these movies.
In the case of The Wave, however, it’s a real disaster that has happened. Part of my family is Norwegian, and I grew up with folk tales about giant waves that wiped out towns in remote fjord regions. It turns out that this is true and has been happened several times in recent history. What happens is that a part of a mountain that borders a fjord cracks away, slides into the water and generates a huge splash. As the wave from the splash travels up the narrowing waterway, the height is amplified. The resulting wave can be far higher than an earthquake tsunami and wipes out anything in its path. That’s the plot of The Wave. This movie was the most popular movie in Norway back in 2015, won some awards there as well as being nominated for several American awards.
It’s a normal day in Norway (cold and gray that is) when a geologist, Kristian Eikjord, starts his day. He has gotten a better job with an oil company. He and his family will be moving so he’s finishing on his current job, which is monitoring vulnerable mountains that sit next to fjords. Being a movie of this type, you know that things are going to go downhill (in more ways than one) pretty soon. In this case, he wants to move on to his new job, but notices that changes are occurring in the mountain and, being a dedicated guy, he alerts colleagues and authorities. They are skeptical about setting off an alert system that triggers evacuations, but they look at his evidence and are convinced….something real bad is about to happen. Alerts are triggered, evacuations begin and once the mountain starts to slide, the best guess is that they have about 10 minutes before the wave hits a small tourist town and hotel that are right on the waterfront. Kristian is a good parent, gathers his kids and alerts his wife, who works in the tourist hotel. She, in turn, is responsible for alerting hotel guests and doing what is needed to get them out of the way. The wave hits the town. It’s a huge disaster, followed by a search for survivors.
If you’ve seen disaster movies before, you can probably guess at the rest of the story. There’s not much original in that. What is different about The Wave, however, is just how sincere the movie seems. It doesn’t have all of the usual contrived “Hollywood” characters that populate these movies. The characters all seem like real people, confronted with a terrible situation that threatens their lives. There’s none of the usual callous authority figures that generally play into these movies as villains. Everybody in town knows that this can happen, wished that it would not happen during their lives, but now they have to deal with it within minutes. The fact that the disaster happens so quickly means that there really isn’t much to be done except run or drive as fast as you can uphill. The movie runs a little under 2 hours, is very compact, gets right down to business and doesn’t relent until the end. By the time it is over, you might be breathless.
I won’t list out the cast, characters and director, since none of them seem to be known outside of the land of the Vikings, but they are all quite good. The Wave has none of the stupidity that generally afflicts these sort of movies, plays it straight and is very believable. The Wave is in Norwegian, has subtitles, but, for the most part, you don’t need them. Aside from some of the science at the beginning of the film, it’s mainly action oriented. Dialog is minimal, mostly being screams, pleas for help, and some surprising expletives, rendered in American English, that require no subtitles.
I didn’t set out to watch this film, but being completely overdosed on stupid convention politics that were dominating TV that night, I checked on Netflix and saw this as a recommended movie. I actually didn’t even mean to watch the whole thing, but became riveted. It’s probably the best disaster movie I’ve seen in recent years, is mostly believable, never stupid and quite worth watching if you’re in the mood.