JohnHowardReid Review of The Poseidon Explosion

The Poseidon Explosion (1973)

Quite watchable, despite dubbing and other factors

[8/10 · 29 October 2011]

A Romanian movie, Explozia (1973), figures on a quite watchable "Grindhouse Experience" DVD. Although cut back from 112 minutes to 80 minutes, and somewhat poorly dubbed (admittedly, the dubbing definitely improves as the film progresses), this is actually a high-budget and rather classy film that even made it to the 1973 Moscow Film Festival – mainly because it was based on a true incident and shows how heroically the port authorities swing into action when disaster threatens to wipe out their entire city. Nonetheless, would you believe there are actually two or three bad fish in the barrel – looters who seize the opportunity to help themselves? The movie actually benefits from this policy of not strictly adhering to the Party line as it limns the heroic fire-fighters led by George Dinica who risk their lives to move the blazing ship out of the port. All the special effects are astonishing. Maybe they didn't do it that way, but it certainly looks to me that the film-makers set a real ship on fire. It actually seems frighteningly realistic – the sound effects are mighty persuasive too – and it's as close as I ever want to get to a fire of any description. The director, Mircea Dragan, was deservedly nominated for a Gold Medal at the Moscow Film Festival for his work on this film. (He and his co-director, Mihai Iacob, did win a Silver Medal at the 1961 Festival for their direction of Romania's first CinemaScope movie, a film called Setea or Thirst).