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Amazon.co.uk Review
In 1961, as NATO deploys long-range nuclear attack submarines, the Kremlin forces the Russian Navy to follow suit, whether they're ready or not. Ford takes over from popular skipper Neeson in command of the eponymous submarine, riding the men hard through a missile test, and then coping with an escalating series of crises as a jerry-built reactor threatens to melt down (and perhaps start World War III).
Though the political specifics are fresh, this has all the expected elements of a sub movie, citing everything from Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea and Das Boot to Crimson Tide and The Caine Mutiny as sailors bristle mutinously under a marine martinet. This, along with inept engineering and ideological interference, prompts disaster.
Director Kathryn Bigelow, the most undervalued talent in Hollywood, is in her element with heroic men under pressure, and a terrific central stretch has comrades trying to fix the reactor even though they've been given the wrong protective gear and start coming down with radiation sickness as they work. Less successful is a superfluous epilogue that pulls the old Spielberg present-day-reunion-of-the-aged-survivors-at-a-gravesite gambit. --Kim Newman
Special Features
* Making of K-19: The Widowmaker (20.14)
* 3 featurettes: (Total: 17.54)
- Exploring the Craft: Make-up techniques
- Breaching the Hull
- Its in the Details
* Theatrical Trailer (2.26)
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
we came close to destruction that time,
By
This review is from: K-19 : The Widowmaker [DVD] [2002] (DVD)
This is a well crafted, true story and Exposition of the cold war submariners' duties. The unusual thing is that the Russians are depicted as the good guys. The editing, as signified by the pace of the film is superbly done. The claustrophobic aspects of the ship could have been boring but it was not the case. The two captains are shown as mutually distrusting at first but under duress begin to see the others point of view under the weight of an unreliable and dangerous vessel. The 'rights and wrongs' of politics are left aside and the crews lives are shown during this catastrophic failure.
14 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great Suspense Throughout The Movie,
By A.P. VAN WORT (Capelle a/d IJssel, ZH Netherlands) - See all my reviews
This review is from: K-19 : The Widowmaker [DVD] [2002] (DVD)
K19, the Widow Maker is a suspense full movie that keeps you guessing the outcome. Your emotions that calls for anger turns into applause and in the final outcome you realize that people, also people that are on the other side are worthy of their courage, their dedication, loyalty and honor to their Nation.
9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Underrated gem from a lovable director who seldom gets it right,
By
This review is from: K-19 : The Widowmaker [DVD] [2002] (DVD)
K-19 may be historically inaccurate, but show me a military movie that isn't. This film is way more true to life than the idiotic fantasy that was U-571, in which Americans won the second world war by capturing a cipher machine (FYI, it was a British crew who captured the machine and anyway the Brits already had one, reverse-engineered by Polish intelligence and given to them in one of the more stunningly generous acts of wartime cooperation).The important thing is not so much how doggedly authentic the story is. After all, Wolfgang Petersen's classic 'Das Boot', surely the ultimate sub movie ever in its original miniseries form, is fictional. What matters is the quality of the story, and the story told here in K-19 is profoundly touching. Harrison Ford seems really engaged for the first time in a long time, Liam Neeson is properly cast for a change as a slightly ambiguous figure (instead of just as a nice guy) and Peter Sarsgaard is heartbreaking as the head of the team that attempts to repair K-19's reactor. Kathryn Bigelow's films have veered between genuinely eerie (Near Dark, The Loveless), silly (Point Break, Blue Steel) and romantic but a bit daft (Strange Days). For my money, this is the first movie she's made that her fans don't have to apologise for. So who cares that the crew all have silly Russian accents? Like you'd prefer that Harrison Ford sounded American and Liam Neeson sounded like he was from Ballymena? The sadness and grimness of life in the USSR have not generally been paid attention to by US filmmakers, who for the most part portrayed Soviets as cannon fodder, but this is a brave effort and a gripping and affecting movie.
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