Disaster is an Environmental Family Affair in ‘The Wave’

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CHICAGO – Last year, we witnessed the American disaster porn of “San Andreas,” an overwrought attempt to destroy California on film. Norway has an entry into the disaster genre – “The Wave” – and unlike the American special effects pile-on, it’s based on real possibilities, and features a family that won’t give up or give in.

The film is two movies, pre-and-post the wave (tsunami) disaster, and the beginning is better and more tense than the post wave turmoil, but overall the film is absorbing in the way that all the better “what ifs” are. The Scandinavian emotions presented are much more pragmatic and less “heroic” – as would be seen in a modern American disaster movie. The depiction of the disaster is based on a real-world possibility, there are towns among some of high cliffs of Norway, and those cliffs are unstable (much like the relationships of the family in the film). For obtaining “Norwegian Wood,” there is nothing like a fine disaster picture.

Kristian (Kristoffer Joner) is on his last days at the Akneset mountain pass monitoring center, part of the Geiranger fjord. There he has analyzed data regarding the mountain, for in earlier times it had avalanched, and caused tsunami waves that destroyed the town of Geiranger itself (now a popular tourist destination). His wife Idun (Ane Dahl Torp) is a hotel manager in the town, and is also preparing her family to move, once Kristian starts his new job.

Kristoffer Joner
Run Away! Kristian (Kristoffer Joner, right) is About to Experience ‘The Wave’
Photo credit: Magnolia Pictures

The mountain is shored by manmade rods and sensors, and Kristian sees an abnormality that could trigger the wave. Their son Sondre (Jonas Hoff Oftebro) is staying at his mother’s hotel when the tsunami hits. They all survive, but they are separated. Kristian works to get to the inundated hotel, while Idun and Sondre are trapped in a underground shelter in the building. The father must get through the chaos to save the mother and son.


By placing the context of the disaster into a possibility in reality, the film succeeds in being engrossing and edge-of-the-seat. Throwing in the “one more mission before I leave” movie cliché also winks at the camera a bit, and the anticipation towards the oncoming wave is fairly compelling storytelling. Especially interesting is the actual science behind the seismic activity, and Norway’s stopgap monitoring that actually exists.



The acting in this is different than an American disaster film as well, with a Nordic feel to the reactions of the townspeople. It’s more efficient and pragmatic, even in panic, which was as situational as the special effects and event itself. Kristoffer Joner portrays an obsessed geologist/scientist, finding it impossible to rip himself from his post after discovering the abnormalities. In an American film, someone like Dwayne Johnson would know everything and “outrun the fireball.” With Kristian, it was more about “I hate it when I’m right.”


There is something about an event that could happen, and then showing it realistically, that made “The Wave” a bit more soul chilling. We live in an information age, where data is available at a click of a button, inside a computer in our pockets (in general). So when the monitoring station, which does actually exist, finds itself in the aftermath of what they had to monitor, then that air raid alarm cuts right to the fear of nature that we all possess.

Kristoffer Joner
Sondre (Jonas Hoff Oftebro) and Idun (Ane Dahl Torp) in ‘The Wave’
Photo credit: Magnolia Pictures

It was unfortunate that post the disaster the film devolved into a more ordinary save-the-family focus – except for one act of survival that Idun commits to a fellow traveler. Kristian goes into that Dwayne Johnson mode, instinctively knowing where to go afterward, and doing some nicely impossible acts. It doesn’t derail the overall film in any way, it simply is a choice that the story makes which isn’t as cool as the pre-disaster front piece.

Regardless, I will look forward to more American film genre attempts by the Norwegians. Perhaps an existential western? A teen sex comedy, contemplating mortality? A Rocky-like sports movie, in which the hero can’t get out of bed? Nordic creators, start your laptops.

“The Wave” has a limited release, including Chicago, on March 4th. See local listings for theaters and show times. Featuring Ane Dahl Torp, Krisoffer Joner, Jonas Hoff Oftebro and Thomas Bo Larsen. Written by John Kare Raake and Harald Rosenlow-Eng. Directed by Roar Uthaug. Rated “R”

HollywoodChicago.com senior staff writer Patrick McDonald

By PATRICK McDONALD
Writer, Editorial Coordinator
HollywoodChicago.com
pat@hollywoodchicago.com

© 2016 Patrick McDonald, HollywoodChicago.com

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