Floody Awful (Flood (DVD))

Name: plipplop

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Product:	Flood (DVD)
Date:	03.11.07 (212 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Some of the visuals

Disadvantages: Script, plot, acting and so on

As a massive storm front hits the North East coast of Scotland, the British government finds itself unable to offer any appropriate response. Without any real warning from the Met Office, dozens of lives are lost and all that everyone can do is hope that the storm moves out to sea as the projections suggest. In London, preparations are made at The Thames Barrier to manage high tide, but a notable professor has reservations about the barrier's ability to contain the volume of water heading its way. When the forecast suggests that the storm will indeed move out to sea, the government breathes a sigh of relief. But the forecaster's reliability is drawn further into question when the storm changes direction once more and a massive wave of water heads for the centre of the capital, with devastating consequences.

Whatever your criticisms of them may be, there are some things that the Americans do best – and the disaster movie. Heroic leads, spectacular scenes of disaster, emotional back-stories and implausible events are staple ingredients of the genre but let's face it, they work pretty well. Sadly, this is a fact that seems to have been missed by the makers of Flood, a British-made direct to DVD disaster epic that has delusions of being something that, clearly, it is not. Buckle yourself in; you're in for a bumpy ride.

The premise of Flood is entirely plausible. It's a clearly stated scientific fact that our capital city is at threat from a freak weather event, worsened by the increasing phenomenon of global warming. Scientists lack confidence that The Thames Barrier would be able to contain a large enough surge of water and Flood depicts exactly what would happen if the unthinkable became fact. In an attempt to be realistic and factual, the makers seem to have researched a little of the government's emergency procedures, depicting the members of the government's emergency committee (COBRA) going through the motions of appearing to manage the developing crisis. In reality, of course, the point is that the government is entirely unprepared for any such event and in an attempt to expose this the plot gives the committee three hours to evacuate the entire metropolitan area of London with predictably devastating failure.

Flood allegedly "boasts" a cast of much-loved British actors. The reality is that it's chock-full of uninspiring (and more crucially) badly-cast faces, working with a terrible script and a limited budget. David Suchet is utterly unconvincing as the Deputy Prime Minister, seemingly having tantrums at every turn and showing no real concept of what leadership might look like. There's a female police commissioner (Joanne Whalley) balancing up the equality debate but not really leading us to believe that she's actually up to it. In truly sexist fashion, because she's a woman she's more worried about her kids, an emotional burden that a male counterpart would, presumably, not have to consider. Tom Courtenay (as the professor who suspects that everybody is about to drown) is perhaps just a little too veteran for the role, with a complete absence of energy in either voice or person. But this lot pales into comparison with our leading cast members, Robert Carlyle and Jessalyn Gilsig.

Needless to say, the estranged couple has an emotional history complicated by the fact that they must now work together to save London. Hence, there's a drivelous back story about why they split up, who she's now dating and other associated family sagas that adds neither depth nor human interest to the story. Gilsig works her way through things with some aplomb but, again, is completely unconvincing in seniority and there really as a bit of eye candy more than anything else. Carlyle, on the other hand, hits a career low with one of the least inspiring performances I think I've ever seen. Stitched up with dodgy dialogue, a tiresome London accent and an apparent lack of interest in the proceedings, Carlyle is utterly tedious from start to finish.

The overall tone of the piece is completely misplaced. Rather like an extended episode of Spooks, there's a constantly increasing pace to convince us about how exciting it all is, with a repetitive, uninteresting snatch of "action music" accompanying every scene. The action switches from one place to another at a rate of knots, the timeline spelt out on the screen for those of us losing the will to live, as well as "state of the art" digital annotations flashing in front of us, telling us the current location. The film is stuffed with continuity errors; one minute it's raining in London, the next passengers scurry out of the Tube system in broad daylight. Little / no attention is paid to geographical details, so that most of East Anglia is apparently wiped off the map with barely any attention because the loss of London is clearly so much more important. Keep a look out for the guys from the Met Office who are based in Exeter one minute, only to be with the deputy prime minister in London the next, and then back in Exeter again an hour later. That's some rail service they're using.

As a disaster movie, Flood is, of course, ram full of those stupid things that have you scratching your head in bewilderment. To escape the coming tidal wave (of epic proportions remember) our two heroes find themselves stranded on top of the Flood Barrier and opt to jump into the torrent of water to escape. Despite the obvious freezing cold (they're dressed in office wear) and the sheer volume of water moving at an incredible speed, they somehow manage to swim to the Millennium Dome and reach relative safety – and the lady still has both her slip on, high-heeled shoes on. What? Who writes this stuff? Probably the same made bunch of people who, faced with rising flood waters in the city, believe that their best chance of escape is to sit in their cars and try and make it through rush-hour London traffic. (Remember that they only need to reach high ground. Personally, I'd just climb to the top floor of the Gherkin. I understand the views are fabulous.)

This kind of detail and stupidity makes Flood unforgivable and your average, semi-intelligent viewer will feel either short-changed, insulted or both. Indeed, it's extremely hard to sit through this, any tolerance for the visual bits undermined completely by the abject rubbishness of the rest.

In principal, this is a bit of a shame, because the visual potential is enormous. The film's only saving grace is that some of the grand-scale scenes of disaster are surprisingly convincing, with no opportunity wasted to trash famous London land-marks. Highlights include an enormous wave of water bursting through Tower Bridge, taking every road-bound vehicle with it and the demise of the Houses of Parliament, lights going off one by one as every floor fills with water, supposedly washing the nasty little politicians out of their ill-won seats. When the action settles down, there's an eerie calm about the city as countless bodies float past flooded streets, rare moments of poignancy capturing the human tragedy of what has happened. Director Tony Mitchell would have been wise to focus his efforts in these areas, potentially pulling together a dramatic and disturbing prediction of impending doom. The reality is that with limited budget and a television drama audience to please, he sets his sights rather lower and cops out in every way possible.

I didn't quite make it to the end of Flood. With about fifteen minutes to go, the terrible acting, incredibly poor script and inherently naff tone of the piece overwhelmed me and I had to switch off. At best, this is a TV movie with delusions of being something more. At worst, it's a really bad example of British drama, and evidence that whilst the American approach may be excessive, it is, at least, entertaining and rather more convincing than this.

The region 2 DVD was released on October 29th and currently retails for around £12. It is not worth it.

Summary: I watched a rubbish film the Day Before Yesterday