7/03/00 9:00 a.m.
“We’re Gloucestermen!”
Reviewing The Perfect Storm.

By Rich Lowry, NR Editor-------------------------------richardlowry@hotmail.com

his is as elemental as it gets: swordfish bludgeoned and gutted, fishhooks accidentally catching and tearing through hands, and, of course, the weather, the “elements” in a mad explosion of fury that eventually rips apart and sinks the fishing boat Andrea Gail.

The brilliance of Sebastian Junger’s The Perfect Storm was not just in its subject matter that has spawned an entire genre of derivative disaster books, but in its evocation of a bizarre sub-culture. In this, it belongs in the same category as such minor classics as Bill Buford’s Among the Thugs and Hunter Thompson’s Hell’s Angels — books that capture an alien way of life.

In the case of The Perfect Storm, it is the life of Gloucester fishermen. “We’re in the 19th century now!” the captain of the Andrea Gail, played by George Clooney, exclaims in the excellent movie version after the ship’s radio goes out. But he and his men have really never left it.

They live with risk and grime and the whims of nature in a way that few people in America do anymore. Hence, the grim fascination with their lives — with the emphasis on grim.

These fisherman are hyper-modern in one sense — all their marriages are broken up, with their former wives and their children scattered to the winds. The Gloucester economy isn’t throwing off great opportunities, so they are left with the crap-shoot of fishing for swordfish, with no certainty that they will make any money on a given trip, or return to shore intact.

So, there is a backdrop of desperation from the beginning of the Andrea Gail’s final voyage. But when the ship is hauling in swordfish, the men exult at doing their job well, the decks awash with blood, the air filled with their hoots and hollers.

Even when the storm begins in earnest, Clooney the captain thrills to the challenge of steering his pug-nosed boat through it. Surely, Hollywood is skimping here on what must have been the gut-wrenching fear aboard the real Andrea Gail.

But then again Clooney’s sentiment is believable because his world is one of difficulty and duty, “the perfect storm” just a particularly intense occasion for both. “We’re Gloucestermen!” is the rallying cry that sends the fishermen on their attempt to bulldog their way through the storm in the first place.

And what a storm! The special effects are stomach-droppingly good, rendering scenes that — without any gore — make you squirm and want to look away from the screen.

In the book, we don’t really know what happens to the crew of the Andrea Gail. Junger can only guess, and the mystery affords a kind of dignity to their deaths. In the movie, we watch their final struggles, knowing that their fight will have no redemption. As a consequence, the film labors under a pervasive sadness.

Maybe this is why a sugary sweet final several minutes were tacked on to the movie. But, needless to say, Gloucestermen would be the last people to believe in happy endings.