BIG MIRACLE

Drama

PRINCIPAL CAST MEMBERS
John Krasinski: local television news reporter Adam Carlson
Ahmaogak Sweeney: native Alaskan 11-year-old Nathan
Drew Barrymore: his ex-girlfriend, Greenpeace volunteer Rachel Kramer
Kristen Bell: L.A. television news reporter Jill Jerard
Ted Danson: oil executive J.W. McGraw, President of Alaskan Oil Corporation
Dermot Mulroney: Alaska Army National Guard Colonel Scott Boyer
Vinessa Shaw: presidential aide Kelly Meyers

REVIEW
This family nature story is based on an actual event that took place in October 1988 (although the producers have taken a few liberties as noted below in the Nitpick section) when three gray whales got trapped in the ice near Point Barrow, Alaska. With a straight forward timeline, we get to see the frantic efforts against-the-clock to rescue these animals as winter approaches.

It’s interesting to see the various agendas the participants had but in the end the feel-good message is that everybody sets aside their petty differences and comes together in a common purpose.

CLASSIFICATION

for some strong language.

FOR NITPICKERS ONLY
• Nathan takes one look at a woman and states “she’s hot”. These events took place in 1988 about 20 years before that colloquial expression became part of the lexicon of descriptive terms.
• The whales were given Inuit names Putu, Siku, and Kanik and English names Bonnet, Crossbeak, and Bone not Fred, Wilma and Bam Bam.
• The two Skycrane helicopters did not tow the barge they planned on using because it was frozen solid in the ice. Instead they repeatedly dropped a 5-ton concrete pillar in an effort to break up the ice.
• If your eyelashes freeze over just put your hand over your eye until the ice melts and you can open your eye. There is no need to resort to more unconventional methods.
• The lowest recorded temperature was 30-degrees below zero, not 50.
• When Rachel dons scuba gear she puts on a pair of gloves and plunges into the hole but in the underwater shots she no longer is wearing gloves but they reappear when she surfaces.
• Winter had not yet set in so the ice was only four or five inches thick not the ten inches or so when seen on edge.
• Water pumps were used to keep the water moving to prevent the ice from forming. Underwater heaters can not raise the sea temperature even one degree and so would be useless.
• The authorities would not allow the rescuers and the international media covering the event to remain standing directly in the path of a huge icebreaker intent on breaking though to them.

P.S.
Stihl chainsaws is one of the most blatant product placement campaigns ever, lacking the subtly usually associated with this form of marketing with close-ups of their product every chance they get.

P.S.S.
Stick around for the end credits when the photos of the real people are paired with their movie counterpart.