Now, just what did I get for diving deep into this? I saw in the beginning Ed Harris playing the aforementioned Demi, an about-to-retire Russian sub skipper given one last cruise before he hangs up his Captain's rank for good (the Admiral who gives him his diving orders is played always excellently by Lance Henrickson). The boat is an old diesel powered missile carrier, and interestingly, also about to retire (she will be stripped of her classified gear and sold to the Chinese after this cruise). It is also the boat he first commanded when Demi rose to the position of Captain.
To complicate things even more, some "civilians" are in the ship's company for this mission, their purpose and identities cloudy. Eventually, it comes out that they are Spetznaz commandos, elite Soviet soldiers with an agenda of their own, which on the surface looks like the testing of new gear designed to disguise the boat's acoustic signature, making it appear to be other ships. Which is cool, but...Demi is suspicious of Bruni (Duchovny) and the other commandos.
I am not sure what those who gave the film negative reviews saw, but I saw a well acted, well produced submarine movie which played well with convention of this kind of film, distrust and paranoia in claustrophobic conditions. I also saw a film construct a story out of an apparent near thing in actual history, the loss of a Russian missile submarine in 1968 at the height of the Cold War. Also, a single launched missle was alleged to have been found.
This is a taught, modest tale in the genre with a melancholy ending, about old soldiers giving all, and the wonder if the state they serve appreciates their sacrifies and that of their families.
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