Review: Big Miracle

To enjoy Big Miracle, you have to buy into it, and to buy into it, you have to watch it with the eyes of a child. When I say “buy into it,” I don’t mean to believe in the movie’s plausibility—this is that rare “true story” that’s actually true—but rather, to accept its sentiment. It is a dramatized account of a popular national news item from 1988—a family of three whales trapped behind a wall of ice off the coast of Barrow, Alaska—told from the perspective of a local boy (Ahmaogak Sweeney), the TV reporter who broke the story (John Krasinski), and a Greenpeace activist (Drew Barrymore). Director Ken Kwapis cheers on the rescue attempt every step of the way – even as the Alaskans, a big oil company, and President Reagan himself (calling upon the Soviets to help!) invest countless dollars and man-hours, the latter two for political reasons. The adult viewer’s brain may wisely question how those efforts could have been better spent helping humans, thus necessitating the shift to the less cynical POV of a kid (not coincidentally, the film’s target audience).

Does the above mean that Big Miracle is a fundamentally childish, puerile movie? Perhaps, but that often hasn’t stopped most of us from enjoying escapist fare that has required even greater suspension of intellect (the Iron Man and Bourne films, for instance) in the past. On the same token, Hollywood has never approached a true story without some degree of revisionism. I would rather play the pessimist about such logical deficiencies when the movie in question is actually poorly made, which Big Miracle is not. In fact, provided you go along with it, this is quite the breezy, involving underdog (underwhale?) picture. Even if the original hoopla over the story wasn’t warranted and the material about unknowing animals finally allowing the Americans and the Russians to unite for the common good is politically correct gobbledygook, director Kwapis and the committed cast make the inner-child in every viewer care that these poor whales make it out of the ice-blockade unharmed.

I don’t mean to argue that the movie is void of actions worth celebrating on the merits, either. Scenes in which the town comes together to dig a path of holes in the ice to help the whales escape are as moving as any you’ll find in a squeaky-clean Hollywood production. A sequence in which two Minnesota brothers hop on a plane to lend their newly-invented deicing machine to the effort should likewise elicit smiles from most viewers. Furthermore, for as silly as the story’s popularity may have been in the scheme of things, the movie’s ability to serve as an encapsulation of a bygone era—way, way back when an item on the nightly news could captivate an entire nation—is surprisingly compelling.

The likable characters and performances seal the deal. John Krasinski plays a less snarky, more ambitious version of his everyman persona on “The Office” – an amiable take on the “small-town journalist committed to making a big difference”-archetype. Drew Barrymore clearly believes in her hippy-dippy character, which works well because any level of externalization by the actress would have corrupted the purity of the woman’s over-the-top intentions. (Side question for the environmentalists out there: Why would a Greenpeace activist be opposed to letting nature take its course in this situation?) And perhaps most enjoyable in the film is Kristen Bell, who with her usual bubbly gusto plays an L.A. reporter who heads to Barrow for the scoop.

There are better movies for the whole family out there right now—Hugo, We Bought a Zoo, and the Beauty and the Beast re-release—but that doesn’t take away from the fact that Big Miracle is good, wholesome entertainment. As long as you don’t question the movie’s loose conception of heroism, you’ll like it just fine.

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Big Miracle (2012, USA). Produced by Stuart M. Besser, Tim Bevan, Liza Chasin, Eric Fellner, Steve Golin, Paul Green, and Michael Sugar. Directed by Ken Kwapis. Written for the screen by Jack Amiel and Michael Begler, based on the book by Thomas Rose. Starring John Krasinski, Drew Barrymore, Ahmaogak Sweeney, Kristen Bell, Ted Danson, Tim Blake Nelson, and Vinessa Shaw. Distributed by Universal Pictures. Rated PG, with a running time of 107 minutes.