Sometimes the best part of the past is the blurry nature of it. With it being so nebulous in some regards it is fertile ground for storytellers to make good stories. One of those great times is the Cold War there were so much cloak and dagger and military things going on with the secret battle of wills between the United States and the Soviet Union with the fate of the world at the balance that it makes perfect sense to want to go back to that time. The film Phantom is a film that is making a story out of what happened to missing Soviet Submarine K-129 and what could’ve caused for it to sink and the mystery around its failed missile launch.
Phantom is set in the late 1960 during the Cold War where a soon to be retired submarine captain, Demi (Ed Harris) is pushed into one last mission with his crew. He has to use the first sub he ever captained for this secret KGB mission in the south pacific. The crew while disappointed that they don’t get the leave they were promised is loyal to Demi and go forward with manning the old sub for the mission. Along the way Demi is having dreams from his past haunt him during the mission and KGB agents on the sub are not all what they seem to be.
Ok the first thing you have to get past in this movie is that it’s entirely in English. Not English with crazy Rocky and Bullwinkle accents either. Just normal American accents. You know they didn’t even try to “otherize” these people with an English accent. Most of the time you totally forget that these are soviets until they make pretty generic remark about Russia or the Americans. Now with that being said Ed Harris does a pretty good job as the Captain Demi. He looks mentally tired throughout most of the film. You believe he seen some terrible things in his day. Most of the other actors in the crew do a fine job also. They all feel like they are a crew that have known and worked with each other for a while. None of the interactions feel forced or unnatural between them. David Duchovny is a bit too on the nose with the suspiciousness in his performance. He’s clearly playing a bad guy and one that you can’t really side with or understand his motivations.
One thing that is really done well is the direction inside of the submarine. Every shot is tight and either close up or medium shot. It gives an effect of the claustrophobic nature of subs especially the old ones from the mid twentieth century. The sound and the score really aren’t that memorable and that might be good thing or bad thing. Nothing really distracted you from what you are watching. Now if you really enjoy a great memorable score than you will not find one here. The filmmakers also did well with keeping the film tight in terms of time. It’s not too long or too short. No matter if you will like the story or not, the screen time is not an issue that should affect that judgment.
Now this with this film as you get into it, after you get past the accents and issues with the crew you do have decent movie about captain and his boat, which happens to be sub and unknown others on it vying for control. It does well as a thriller in the middle 45 minutes but it’s the end that can completely take you out of it. It goes towards a thing that is a tad bit fantastic and heart string pulling that is unnecessary. They also tack on this speculative information on the end since this story was inspired by true events. In the end that harms the film greatly. They should’ve gone for a more grounded ending and let the viewer wonder in the end but they didn’t and the movie is lesser for it.
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