Moby Dick

'98. Herman Melville's mad Captain Ahab spends years hunting the white whale that got his leg. Starring: Patrick Stewart, Henry Thomas, Ted Levine, Gregory Peck, Piripi Waretini, Hugh Keays-Byrne. 3 hr. 12 minutes.

Syfy Saturday movie from 6/18. The glorious return of my movie reviews. I watched a few, but they weren't worth of review. Or, more accurately (as none of these really are worthy), I wasn't really in the mood.

Oh, how I wish this were the movie described by that definition. The first thing that tipped me off was that the recording on the DVR was only 2 hours. In which they are somehow able to jam 3 and a quarter hours of movie. I suppose you may have anticipated that I'd have something to say about the length of this movie, as I have never, in the past, appended the length part of the description from the DVR to the intro to my review. Couple that with the fact that I am currently reading the book, with the fact that it stars Captain Picard and someone named Piripi Waretini. That should spell a pretty dang awesome movie.

Unfortunately this one is in fact a 2010 movie by The Asylum (ugh). Starring Barry Bostwick. And no one named Piripi Waretini. Which makes me sad. On multiple levels. But, instead of fretting about it, I'm going to pretend that the whale is not actually named Moby Dick, but in fact Piripi Waretini. I'm not really sure why they decided to name the movie Moby Dick, if the whale is actually named Piripi Waretini, but I'm not really gonna question that fact. They probably thought they could make more money if they named the movie after a famous novel. But, I would maintain that a movie named Piripi Waretini would have made them far more money. But then again, the fact that they didn't make a lot of money on this film is probably sparing us from having to watch a bunch of further movies of its terrible ilk.

The U.S. Navy has quite possibly the worst torpedoes in the history of time. Or more accurately, they are probably the worst weapons in the history of time. Can't hit an unmoving 600 foot long whale, and then decides to follow it (after abruptly veering off course to miss), and then decides to hit the submarine that fired it. From a completely different angle than the whale passed the sub. Which basically means that it wasn't even following the whale anymore.

Also, apparently everyone's definition of "white" is pretty significantly different. From what I can tell, Piripi Waretini is a dark gray whale, and not in fact a white whale. But what do I know, I'm not a whalologist. In fact, though I have a biology degree, none of my classes were in the field of whalology.

In other news, Barry Bostwick has gotten quite lumpy in his old age. Also, his hair is pretty significantly whiter than Piripi Waretini is. Maybe that'll be the twist at the end of the movie. The whale is actually Captain Ahab, and the captain is actually the whale. Now imagine that I had used proper nouns throughout that last sentence. That could have been the most delightfully convoluted sentence I've ever written. And that is some accomplishment...

Also, the Pequod is a submarine, and not a whaling ship. FYI.

Unfortunately, I am not far enough into reading Moby Dick to see if his dialogue is pulled from the book or not. If it isn't he certainly does have a rather contrived and ridiculous manner of speaking. Acceptable for a 19th century ship captain, but not so much for a 21st century submarine captain.

And now I'm wondering what the range of a V-22 Osprey is without refueling. Because some random ass character is flying from San Diego to a submarine close to Hawaii. Apparently the range is over 2200 miles with auxiliary fuel tanks. So, I guess it is somewhat feasible. In that I'm not 100% certain how far San Diego is from any suitable landing spot in Hawaii. Or how far off shore he's headed. Because, as we all know, once the main character gets off, no one gives a rip about the pilot who's gonna run out of fuel, crash, and die.

Although, I think I have now identified why the torpedoes are so craptacular. Because they seem to actually be air-to-air missiles. And the SUBROC, which in real life looks vaguely like an air-to-air missle, looks like a standard torpedo in this movie. Makes perfect sense, I guess.

In other news, apparently Captain Ahab doesn't require any sort of authorization to launch nuclear weapons at whales. But then again, he is kinda a nutbag, so I guess that all makes a bit of sense. Really, the only thing in this movie thus far that does.

Also, apparently where there are squid, there are whales. And where there are squid, crazy people are gonna nuke the everloving shit out of them. Because why not.

In other news: Holy crap. The Pequod is gigantic on the inside. This is the sort of submarine that I wouldn't mind serving on. Aside from the gigantic nutbag in charge.

Also, after some random ass Wikipedia research that went horribly misguided and awry, I have come to the conclusion that the British name their ships a lot more awesomely than we do. Case and point, the HMS Grampus. I would be proud to serve on anything named Grampus. The names of all the British subs since 1993: Vanguard, Victorious, Vigilant, Vengeance, Astute, Ambush, Artful, Audacious, Agamemnon, Anson, Ajax. That's a pretty good string of names.

Also, when did the Osprey gain a gun? Especially a gun of sufficient caliber to have any effect on a 600 foot long whale.

Also, tip for movie making: If you are using an airsoft gun as a prop, make sure that no one sees the top of the magazine. As it is pretty obvious that it isn't a real gun.

And keeping with the apparent U.S. Navy tradition of speaking in a completely stilted manner, Chief Stubbs has now started at it as well.

Also, something I may have learned if I actually took some whaleology classes: Apparently whales are quite capable of flying.

And Queequeg does seem to make a delightful squishing noise when a flying whale decides to use him as a runway.

And the Pequod just nuked an island. For little to no apparent reason.