1960 – The Last Voyage
Here we have a true disaster film, worthy to stand in the company of other great disaster films like The Towering Inferno, the Poseidon Adventure, and Airport 57. And in light of that, the quality of the special effects didn’t disappoint. So why didn’t I award them a five star rating? Because the special effects just weren’t that visually interesting, and there weren’t as many of them as I would have liked.
The movie was about an old cruise ship that was going to be decommissioned. Even before the opening credits started to appear on the screen, we are shown that there is a major fire in the boiler room. The fire fuses the pressure valves to the boilers, and it isn’t long before the they explode, ripping a hole through the middle of the ship and breaching the hull. But then most of the movie follows two things. The first is the efforts of a man trying to save his wife who is trapped under the wreckage. The second is the crew of the ship trying to convince the Captain to follow safety precautions.
In other words, there was more drama than action, and while there is nothing wrong with that, it didn’t leave a lot of room for visual effects. That being said, the fiery explosions were pretty spectacular! Also, the flooding of the engine room was pretty well-done. At first they tried to shore up the bulkheads with wooden beams, but eventually the water started seeping through the walls. The trickle became a spray, which eventually became a flood.
The part where the smoke stack cracks in half and falls on the captain’s office was cool. The black billows of smoke that rose from the breach were realistic. But we never actually see the Captain getting crushed. We see the crash, and then when the First Mate investigates, we see the Captain’s head sticking out of the rubble just enough to allow him to have a dramatic death scene.
But unfortunately, the climactic ending was a bit anticlimactic. During the whole sinking of the cruise ship, we are periodically shown some wide angle shots as the life boats flee. The sinking ship remained mostly level in the water. In the close-ups, rooms and decks were being submerged, but in the wide shots, the ship was level? And only once, as the man, his rescued wife, and the crew members who helped them are running for their lives, do we see them on a slanting floor.
Then as they tryto escape the foundering vessel, the water is flowing over the deck faster thanthey can run. It isn’t long before theyjust hop over the railing and swim to the life boats. And finally, we are shown a black, indistinctshape submerging under the roiling waves. But for that, I must say, it was kind-of weak for the climax of anotherwise OK disaster film. I don’tknow. I guess I just expected a littlemore from what could have been a visually stunning movie.