Ah, the submarine movie. Is there any genre more
predictable? I guess in the confines of the most treacherous and
claustrophobic of vehicles, the writers have less room to maneuver
than the crew. I don't think I'll be spoiling any surprise if
I say that "U-571" delivers all the standard submarine
movie cliches, some of them several times over.
The good news is that, for the most part, this film delivers them pretty well. They take great pains to establish the claustrophobic and ominous environment of a World War II diesel submarine, to such a degree that you start to get nervous long before the torpedoes start launching. My eyes widened when they hollered "DIVE!! DIVE!!!". I cringed when the depth charges came too close. You get the idea. (It was a nice touch, water droplets all over the depth gauge with the needle reading way off the scale.)
It was like a really good episode of Star Trek, only with a lot more action, and the action was a lot more convincing, because this stuff really happened. If I had to have a torpedo fight, I think I'd rather be sitting in a padded chair in a nice, spacious, well-lit, futuristic "bridge", surrounded by all manner of magical technology. You'd really have to have brass ones to go out in a cramped, dark, noisy, tin can with nothing but needle gauges and faucet handles to see & move your way around. But that's how they did it, and that's what "U-571" conveys very well.
Alas, the film gets to be just a bit long on action and a bit short on credibility. It takes inspiration from 3 real-life events, but instead of averaging the 3 into one almost believable yarn, it sums all three, and then it goes even more over the top. Although the action sequences hold up extremely well individually, it becomes a bit preposterous when you step back and contemplate the whole story. And then there's the dialogue, which gets pretty hoakey, sometimes.
Which is not to say that "U-571" is utterly without substance. It's not very deep by any stretch of the imagination, but it's not nearly as shallow as it could have been. The screenplay contained enough perspective to save the movie from being an annoying GI Joe chest beater. (I have to give the writers kudos for including a lot of really young high school age kids as part of the crew. A lot of war movies seem to forget that teenagers ever saw combat. It moved me to think that the same fresh faces that play Nintendo and cruise the boulevard in mom's Acura today were dying all kinds of horrific deaths out in the Atlantic by the hundreds, 60 years ago.)
Matthew McConaughey, Bill Paxton, Harvey Keitel and crew were all just fine in their roles. They each had more than their fair share of cheesy lines, but they also came through with some strong acting. I was sure ready to torpedo Jon Bon Jovi, but he fit in so well, I didn't notice him. I was too absorbed with the rest of the movie.
"Das Boot" remains the only one to see if stark realism and true originality are what you crave in a submarine movie. I'd say that "U-571" pulls in at a distant, but commendable second place, leaving other contemporary offerings like "The Hunt for Red October" and "Crimson Tide" far behind. There's a tiny bit of food for thought, and all the while you get to cling to the edge of your seat and watch a lot of things blow up reeeal good!!