All Is Lost Movie Review

All Is Lost (2013)

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Written by: J.C. Chandor
Directed by:J.C. Chandor
Starring: Robert Redford
Rated: PG-13
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Plot
After a collision with a shipping container at sea, a resourceful sailor finds himself, despite all efforts to the contrary, staring his mortality in the face.

Verdict
It's a movie that focuses on story. There is no dialog and just one character. We watch him manage an adverse situation, and it's incredibly gripping. He's almost always battling the environment with one problem running into another. The question is always what will he do next and how will he react. There's no exposition, no character explaining anything. We can only ardently watch and find out his fate. 
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Review
This was Chandor's second movie after Margin Call, and it's quite the performance for Redford. He has to carry the entire movie as the only actor we ever see. There's very little dialog, and most of that is in a voice over in the beginning that foretells his doom. While I typically don't like the use of the how we got here trope, in this movie it works very well by lowering expectations and making everything we see more bleak.

Never named and only referred to in the credits as "Our Man," his ship runs into a lost cargo container floating in the ocean. Our Man wakes up unsure of what's happening, water in the floor. He soon realizes his dire situation, having to figure out how to separate his ship from the container. Even then, there's still a hole in his boat.

Robert Redford plays "Our Man"

While I've seen complaints from sailors about Our Man's tactics, reactions, and what's wrong with them, I'm not a sailor and I didn't realize he could have reacted more strategically.

There are no other actors, no exposition. We figure out what he's doing as it happens, unsure until the moment it happens. As he repairs the hole and pumps water out, you wonder why he's on this voyage. Did he want to prove something to himself or others? Did he leave anyone behind? This movie's focus is only on the current task.

This is a case of what can go wrong does. Not only does he hit a cargo container that shouldn't have been in the ocean, it ruins all his equipment, everything. Then a storm approaches. This is just as intense as any action movie despite the smaller scale. The lack of dialog pushes you to be more focused on everything Our Man does. His resolve almost never wavers, then again what's the alternative? He has to fight. There's no one else nor anyone on the way.

A benchmark for a good movie is that you should be able to mute it and still understand the basic story as film by default is a visual medium. This movie puts that to the test and excels. I almost forget there's no dialog. This always trusts the viewer to follow and know, or at least put together, what's happening.

Our Man comes out of this crazy storm, seeing his beaten and battered boat. That's got to hurt. It was a place he felt safe or at least familiar. Now it's gone, and with it some amount of hope. He has to be getting desperate at this point. Nothing has gone his way, and he's facing a real possibility he'll be lost at sea. This entire movie we've watched hope dwindle. When we think it can't get worse, it does.With the ominous opening, we wonder just how bad it can get.