Even permitting for the elastic credibility requirements of the typical survival film, “The Burning Sea” is a stretch. (A favourite second is when the unconscious half of the central couple pops awake at an particularly essential juncture.) But if the machinations of the plot are a tad rickety, its geologic premise is inarguably steady.
Tucking a easy romance inside a catastrophe thriller, the director John Andreas Andersen makes use of an oil-rig collapse off the coast of Norway to ship a dire warning of environmental disruption. When Sofia (a captivating Kristine Kujath Thorp), an underwater robotics professional, joins the crew looking for survivors and a proof for the accident, she’s horrified to be taught {that a} bigger disaster could possibly be imminent. Sadly, mitigation efforts will show too late to forestall Sofia’s boyfriend (Henrik Bjelland), a sweet-natured rig employee, from requiring the type of excessive rescue effort solely a girl in love would undertake.
Nodding to the cataclysmic Deepwater Horizon oil spill in 2010, the screenwriters Lars Gudmestad and Harald Rosenlow-Eeg underscore the presumably calamitous oceanic penalties of many years of drilling. Alternatives for a extra fraught political drama, nevertheless, are principally ignored: When an oil-company govt instructs Sofia to signal a nondisclosure settlement, we count on a minimum of some cover-up shenanigans. As an alternative, we get little greater than a bland romance, easily skilled particular results and a narrative that’s lastly too predictable to boost the center fee.
A extra tantalizing story is teased in segments that bookend the film and, based mostly on interviews with retired oil employees, clarify the cowboy nature of the business’s early days, when coaching consisted of an instruction to “simply comply with the Individuals.” Perhaps not at all times one of the best recommendation.
The Burning Sea
Rated PG-13 for language applicable to the expectation of a fiery, watery loss of life. In Norwegian, with subtitles. Operating time: 1 hour 44 minutes. In theaters and obtainable to lease or purchase on Google Play, Vudu and different streaming platforms and pay TV operators.