Master_and_Commander

Master and Commander: Far Side of the World

Thoughts:

Afterthoughts:

My Advice:

Lucky Jack, indeed.

I have the History Channel's History vs. Hollywood for this movie on as I write this and it's driving a point home that I came out of the movie with. That point consists of one word:

Damn!

Even if the movie was a tenth as accurate in portraying what those Napoeonic-era sailors had to deal with (and from the dialogue behind me it sounds closer to 75% accurate), wow. Those guys had it rough. There were kids my younger sister's age that have bigger ones that most men I know. Of course there were some liberties taken, like [rant] what the hell kind of first officer lets the captain lead the boarding party to the enemy ship?! He's got as good a chance of getting killed one one ship as the other, but his place is on HIS ship! [/rant] Okay. That's out of my system.

A little more explanation of some of the basics of seamanship and life aboard a boat is helpful before seeing the movie, but not necessary. The uninitiated might wonder what a "point" is (the equivalent of 5 degrees), what's with this "leftenant" stuff (it's the British navy. They're lefttenants, not lieutenants), or drop their jaws when they see kindergarten-age kids (they're powder monkeys who bring powder and shot to the cannons during battle) and teenagers (midshipmen were brought in to the service at a very young age) running around with all the duties of sailors three times their ages. Drinking with them, to boot!

Jack and Stephen play pretty closely to the characterizations in the book. Jack is raucous, though a little toned down from what I imagined ("You can name a plant after me. Something prickly and hard to get rid of." Heh.) Stephen is typically bookish and the voice of reason, despite the fact that he pitches a hissy fit that would do a kindergartener proud when Jack decides to track the enemy ship instead of dropping by the Galapagos Islands so Stephen can play with bugs and birds. I like 'em anyway. It's not a buddy-buddy relationship, but the friendship is there and interesting to watch in its dynamics.

This movie is not for the faint of heart. The seas are not the tame blue waters from the Carnival Cruise Lines commercial. Violent storms that give the ones in Kansas a run for their money, cannons booming constantly...and blood. Not Freddy Krueger-slasher blood. Men getting shot, a kid younger than my sister getting part of his arm amputated, and the doctor actually operates on himself to get a bullet out and the camera rarely cuts away from any of it. I can handle a lot of things, but blood isn't one of them, so I actually had to look away at some points, but lemme tell you this right now. People die in this movie. Not bad guys that the hero blows away with a Magnum and the crowd goes whoopty-doo they're dead. No. Bosun's mates, able seamen, leftenants...and most of them are around my age or younger.

Plan for this to take an afternoon or an evening since the movie is almost 2 and a half hours long. Trust me. The only thing that will tell you where the time went will be your bladder. Be prepared to hear some great music as well. The violin and cello duets are mellow and majestic and there are some sea shanties that I MUST learn (and a shout-out to the Jolly Rogers for teaching me the ones that I do know!).

Now if you'll excuse me, I think I'm gonna finish that book now.

Let me preface this pre-review with two tidbits of info:

a) The reason I was initially interested in this movie was the fact that Billy Boyd has a role in it. He's the guy that played Pippin from LotR for those of you who haven't noticed and, judging from the lack of Merry and Pippin in the LotR promo stuff, there's a LOT of people who haven't. You're all missing out. Big time

b) I have tried to read the first book in the Jack Aubrey series by Patrick O'Brien. No, really. I have! Tried, being the operative word here. I cannot get through it! I just get swamped by the language and the nautical terminology. It's not as if this is new stuff to me. I plowed through 3 Horatio Hornblower books, so I know the elementary parts of a ship. Plus, I just don't like the womanizing, arrogant, belligerant character of Captain Aubrey. Stephen Maturin, I like. He's the cool scientific type playing the voice of reason aboard ship...at least that's the impression I get from the book.

THAT aside, this is what I think about the movie from the trailer. I've seen a dozen different trailers on television and not ONE of them had an ounce of plot outline in them. Now that I've seen the one hosted on the exhaulted IMDB, I have a vague idea of what the plot is supposed to be: ship gets attacked, captain gets pissed, lots of boom-action. Okay. This I can deal with.

Captain Aubrey seems to have been matured a little bit in this movie compared to the book. More of a Captain Picard as opposed to a Captain Kirk. Cool. I might like the character a bit more in that case. It's presented as a hero's tale so I might actually be able to get in to this. We'll see tomorrow. Maybe it'll inspire me to finish the frelling book, too!

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