Deepwater Horizon

[Thumper]

Anybody seen it? Everybody I know either doesn't want to see it or already has. But The Kid said she'd see it again with me tonight. So we'll see. I have expectation management. I'm very interested in the facts and the happenings. I expect the movie could fall into the blockbuster action/explosion mold.

[SciFi Chick]

I never heard of it until now, but I like both Kurt Russell and Mark Wahlberg, so I'll check it out when it's available on a streaming service.

[squ1d]

How was it Thump?

[Thumper]

Kind of like I expected. Russell and Wahlberg were both very sympathetic characters. Malkovich played the Evil BP exec who forced the situation and caused the disaster. The second half of the movie was all loud explosions, dangerous projectiles, and lots and lots of fire. Obviously, this is what happened and they did a good job of conveying what it was like to stumble around on a floating oil platform that is exploding around you.

I guess what would have been more satisfying to me would have been more of a documentary with realistic reenactments. I had read a long detailed article shortly after the disaster where the man that Wahlberg played was interviewed. It was very informative and helped me understand more of what was going on from a technical side.

I thought it touching and appropriate at the end: Lost in the evil corporate execs throwing safety out the window in the name of profits, lost in the gigantic ecological disaster who's true costs we may never know for decades, lost in the dichotomy of people like me hating "big oil" and dirty drilling all the while filling our gas tanks with cheap gasoline...Lost were 11 lives. Eleven fathers, sons, husbands, and brothers. At the end we get to see a picture of each one and their names slowly, as the sad closing music plays.

[geonuc]

So, recommended?

[Thumper]

Yeah, I would recommend it.

[vendic]

Last I checked (years ago) the problem was that the blowout preventer was meant to be failsafe but it had a design flaw where one part failed and the whole unit failed. I only write this because if that's the case, I don't see why there has to be a bad ceo to blame. They used a very highly regarded device and it had a serious flaw that was unknown at the time. That disaster was bad engineering (from a third party), not bad management from BP.
Then again, it is a movie so there has to be a big bad somewhere. lol

[SciFi Chick]

Interesting article on the subject.

[Thumper]

There was horrific management, and risk taking, and decision making by BP. Hence the multi-billion dollar judgement against them. The BOP was mis-wired, ignored, un-maintained and not routinely tested and checked. BP ignored this, and ordered a test that was risky especially when they hadn't run confirmation tests on the newly installed concrete plugs.

None of this comes from me watching the movie. I read about 10 articles on the subject and watched numerous interviews and news shows in the year following the disaster.