Based on a true story, Big
Miracle is about the efforts in 1988 to save three Grey Whales from
drowning in frozen seas of Point
Barrow , Alaska , one
of the most northerly inhabited settlements on Earth. Anchorage based reporter Adam Carlson (John Krasinski)
is reporting from Barrow when he spots a small gap in sea ice through which
three whales are struggling to breathe. Once his story gets national coverage,
thousands of reporters, National Guard and Greenpeace activists including Rachel
Kramer (Drew Barrymore) descend on Barrow to cover the story and help set the
whales free.
Although billed as a family film, for me this feels like the
next generation disaster movie. We’ve already seen a shift from the terrorist style
movies of the 90s towards the 2012 environmental
type movies and this feels like the next step. Throughout the film I was
constantly reminded of Deep Impact and
Independence Day. There are several
intertwining stories with overlapping characters, families watching the
proceedings on TV, reporters from all over the world lined up in that tracking
shot which you always get, enemies coming together, several love stories, tragedy
to open the third act and surprising international cooperation saving the day. If
you substituted the whales for a meteor or alien invasion then you have the
exact same disaster film which everyone has seen before.