There is something to be said about a good aquatic voyage. A man can learn a lot about who he is during such a journey. The sailor life, the seven seas, a simple case of nautical nuance. That is what boating is really about. The freedom to be one with nature and to do so surrounded by boundless blue. Hollywood has a sweet spot for such visual aesthetics. The camera crashing in on a sweeping overhead angle as a hard wood pirate ship plows through a wake of water. We all have our favorite films about the open ocean and in each of these films, there is one key character that never says a word. The ship. In honor of these inanimate watercraft vessels, we’ve picked our favorite ten ships throughout the history of cinema.
Here is our pick for 5-1:
5. Acheron; Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World
Many, many people will have no idea this film starring Russel Crowe ever existed, but most critics will tell you that it is one of the greatest films ever to fail in the history of cinema. A lack of marketing is primarily to blame, but Master and Commander was a brilliant piece of work with a steady story and strong performances all around. The HMS Surprise is captained by Russel Crowes’ Captain “Lucky Jack” Aubrey. He is a sensitive and wise captain who cares for his crew, but makes tough decision without hesitation. Throw in a mutton-chopped Paul Bettany performing an old world autopsy and a visit to the Galapagos islands and the movie really kept you involved for it’s 2 hour plus screen time. The Surprise is not our pick, however, it is the Acheron that we chose for number 5. The Acheron, in the film, was a French battleship that plagued the English during the Napoleonic Wars (when the film is set). It is a fast and elusive ship with a cunning captain and crew. Captain Aubrey is tasked with the mission to destroy the Acheron at all costs and so the film plays out with tit-for-tat nautical battles between Crowe’s crew and the mysterious Acheron. Several times, the Acheron ambushes the Surprise and forces Crowe to continually evade and develop new strategies to not just survive, but win. The Acheron is a ghost of a ship, always plagued by it’s ambiguity and amazing ability to arrive anywhere Lucky Jack happens to be. The back and forth between the two is the reason this film carries so much weight and the reason we have it where it is at five.
4. Benthic Explorer; The Abyss
The Abyss was the kind of movie that explored not just the physical deep sea depths of the ocean, but the deep of human emotions. Excitement, paranoia, fear, joy, pain, each emotion compartmentalized and condensed into a two and a half hour film. Enter James Cameron, who developed the premise of the film from a deep sea lecture he went to when he was 17 and you have our pick for the number 4 most famous ship ever. While there was a few ships from the film, the Benthic Explorer was the one we remember. It survived a hurricane attack (somewhat) while Michael Beihn’s team decided to muck around below with water faeries. Yeah, it get’s confusing, but in a good way. Most people don’t realize it, but The Abyss was the first film to ever use water effects CGI in a film. The film was an amazingly powerful film and was built around the Benthic Explorer, unlike some of our other picks that show up occasionally or at the end (Orca and Acheron). Without the Benthic Explorer, there is no story here. When the film hit theaters, it struck audiences in a powerful way. Where Cameron previously had people afraid of the unknown with Aliens, here he gave them something more personal. Sure, these “NTIs” might appear to be creepy water testicles out to murder, but looking closer through the eyes of the characters, we learned the truth of the deep blue below.
3. The Black Pearl; Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of The Black Pearl
You knew it had to show up somewhere, because in less than a decade The Black Pearl has taken over pop culture and it’s ever imaginatively thrifty captain has become one of the most recognized and celebrated characters in the history of film. We all know the name Captain Jack Sparrow because the quick handed, constantly opportunistic pirate is the kind of character only Johnny Depp could master. His love affair with The Black Pearl constantly leads him down the wrong path, but somehow he makes it out ahead every time. The reason we like the Pearl is because of it’s history. Not just a pirate ship owned by a rum-drunk mad man, but it also housed a ghostly curse and battled squid-face Davy Jones and his mythical Flying Dutchman without sinking. In terms of ship statistics, The Pearl has arguably the best numbers on the list. She’s swift, strong and everyone seems to either knows her or wants to possess her. It’s hard to say that the future us will look back at the early 2000′s and remember all the fads that faded as new ones set in. We believe, however, that Captain Jack and The Black Pearl will resonate with human culture far after the series is dead and set adrift (as they are currently gearing up for Pirates 5).
2. HMS Bounty; Mutiny on the Bounty
We had a tough time picking our list because of the great films and vessels that have graced film screens for decades. One that was almost indisputable was the HMS Bounty from the 1935 film, Mutiny on the Bounty. The film, starring Clark Gable and Charles Laughton, won the Academy Award for Best Picture that year and stands as the last film to ever win Best Picture, but lose in ever other category (lost soundly to John Ford’s The Informer). It was this way because the film was so brilliantly portrayed and the story, based of the real life mutiny of the same ship, basically told itself. The HMS Bounty was captained by a cruel, abusive man, William Bligh. Laughton’s rendition of Bligh earned him an Oscar nomination and rightly so. He was a bad, bad mamma jamma. The mutiny on-board The Bounty symbolized many things. Freedom, honor, self confidence, but mostly justice and repercussions for hard behavior. What is amazing about the Bounty is that it was actually built for the film and when you see it on screen, the detail is something to behold. It is our number two.
1. RMS Titanic; Titanic
Somehow, James Cameron managed to make this list twice. It’s hard to eliminate the world’s biggest ship of all time from the list here, especially when you consider that the film not only won eleven Oscars (including Best Picture) but it grossed an obscene $1.8 billion. At the time it was the highest grossing film ever, but would later lose to James Cameron himself with 2009′s Avatar. While I personally might not want to admit that I enjoyed watching the film, Titanic is the kind of movie that builds on a human story and then rips everything apart when the ship starts to sink. The true story of the RMS Titanic, which sunk due to an iceberg slicing through it’s many hulls, is an amazingly tragic one on it’s own. Put some Hollywood spin on it and a little Kate and Leo and we have ourselves the first ever romance turned disaster blockbuster. This also mark a return for Cameron to the deep sea roots he had in 1989 with The Abyss. We’ve picked the Titanic as the number one, not because it grossed more than the others or because it won the awards, but because it is a real story of a real ship. Everyone knows how the Titanic, on it’s one and only voyage, clipped an ice buoy and clung to the bottom of the ocean, but many never understood what had happened and who it happened to. Granted, the whole Jack Dawson story line is extra fictional, but Cameron sewed the real historical passengers in with his story. Bottom line, this is the only film where a whole hour of the film is a boat sinking. An hour of a boat sinking and it worked! That’s props. Putting all that aside, though, we have to pay respect to the CGI and designs of the Titanic. It’s elegant and breathtaking. Even as it splits in two and slugs under the surface, we couldn’t help but be blown away by how it all happened.
Honorable Mentions:
U.S.S. Caine; Caine Mutiny
Andrea Gail; The Perfect Storm
Albatross; White Squall
The Inferno; The Goonies
La Amistad; Amistad
Hispaniola; Treasure Island
Tyler Baker; OSM Writer
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