Heroes at the Local Level

Movie Review:
Ladder 49

2004 / 1 hr., 55 min. / PG-13

Director: Jay Russell

On Veterans’ Day my family goes to the parade that marches through Redmond’s downtown section.  Like every parade in Redmond, you know it is over because the fire trucks drive by.  I remember wondering, as a teenager, who really cared.  I mean, yes, they’re fire trucks; we see them often, thank you.  But on one particular Veterans’ Day in my adulthood, I happened to see Ladder 49 later that evening.  And now I think we should have fire truck parades more often.

Ladder 49 begins with a massive fire in a grain silo in Baltimore where fire brigades are searching for trapped workers.  One worker on the twelfth floor is saved by firefighter Jack Morrison (Joaquin Phoenix) – and then an explosion inside the building sends Jack plummeting to the floor below.  Painfully incapacitated, Jack radios to his captain (John Travolta) outside, and a rescue attempt begins.  As Jack lies on the floor, debris falling around him, we are taken back to his first day on the fire crew, and from there through the highlights of his life so far.

There’s Jack’s arrival at the station, complete with something akin to a mild fraternal hazing by “the boys.”  The rush and thrill of his first call to a fire, with his captain right behind him coaching him on using the fire hose.  The meeting and marrying of a beautiful young lady (Jacinda Barrett).  The joy of a child.  The honor of saving lives from burning buildings.  The solemnity of losing a comrade to an unpredictable blaze and the reminder that firemen do not always come out alive.

The list of scenes in Ladder 49 would suggest that it will settle comfortably into one of the most formulaic, predictable, and droll films ever made on the subject.  But writer Lewis Colick (October Sky) and director Jay Russell (My Dog Skip) have infused the whole production with a certain life of its own.

For one thing, the film is not about fire-fighting.  It is not a macho assembly of action set pieces designed to numb our minds and excite our adrenaline or raw masculinity.  It is an exploration of the people at Station 33.  Our primary focus may be Jack and his rise from rookie to honored hero, but we also get reasonably fleshed-out portraits of the other men.

We get snapshots of the crew’s lives as they loosen up over a few drinks.  We feel a younger brother’s pain when his older brother falls into a burning building.  We are in the hospital with Jack when he sees the face of a comrade after it was boiled off by an exploding steam pipe.  They are only glimpses, to be sure, but they add to the whole picture instead of being ciphers whose only purpose is to direct our attention to Jack.

Joaquin Phoenix (Gladiator, Signs) is an interestingly appropriate choice to play Jack Morrison.  In another (and I would say lesser) version of this plot, our hero would be the sexiest hunk the casting directors could find, and the director would find multiple excuses to feature him shirtless.  Phoenix may be a reasonably nice-looking gent, but he hardly fits the mold.  He has a scar under his nose, and speaks and breathes in a way that hints at nasal injuries earlier in life.  He has a large frame, but it is more hulky than chiseled.  He is starkly lacking a tan.  And one scene in the movie reveals something of a tummy.  While it is not my habit to study the male body, I bring all this up to showcase the wisdom Jay Russell had in casting him.  Phoenix is an excellent choice for an everyman, the average fire-fighter, the man who does not stand out in a fashion or fitness contest.  The man who is simply a husband, a father, and a humble worker in one of those jobs where people neither notice nor thank you until you are directly involved in their lives.

John Travolta (Phenomenon, Get Shorty) plays Jack’s captain in one of his more enjoyable roles.  Travolta is one of those actors I appreciate and tolerate much more now that he has matured.  As I look back over the movie, his role really does not stand out in my memory, and I think that’s because of the way he plays it.  He headlines the show with Phoenix, but he is very much a supporting character instead of a main one.  For Travolta to take his prominent personality and contain it in a smaller character that way takes talent.

Jacinda Barrett (The Human Stain) is the love interest, and her role approaches and recedes at various times.  There are times she is the classic worried wife found in most guy movies, and there are times she is more obviously central, especially to Jack’s life and happiness.

The other characters are somewhat interchangeable, although Robert Patrick’s grouchy older coot on the force makes an effort to stand out more than the others.  His rodent stare that served him well in Terminator 2: Judgment Day is replaced with a roughened interior and exterior, complete with mustache, that makes him more of a scratchy personality than his usual typecasting from his earlier movies.

The film is set in Baltimore, and uses the location for much of its production design.  Some sets were created for scenes of burning interiors, particularly for the grain silo blaze which is very realistic.  Jay Russell and his crew agreed (and finally someone besides me feels this way!) that computer-generated flames do not have the necessary realism for a film where fires are its central pivot.  All of the flames in this film are real, “live” on the set, including the burning chunk that catches Phoenix’s costume on fire as he slides down the collapsing concrete floor of the silo.  I imagine the dangers of shooting for such realism were high, but the result is worth it.

There are a few distractions in the telling of this story.  One is that it covers too much time without being clear about it.  Apart from growing longer hair, Phoenix never seems to age, so it was a lurch in the viewing experience to suddenly land in a scene where his second child (when did she enter the picture?) is having her fifth birthday.  This is only one instance, but there are several times where the delivery makes the passage of time vague, and we are distracted from the storytelling as we pause to figure out when the new scene is taking place.

The other distraction is certain attention-getting camera techniques.  In a handful of scenes, the camera is either functioning as the direct point of view of the character, or it is mounted securely to things like the fire hose nozzle, or an object a fireman is carrying.  These shots jump at us with no preparation, and do little more for the film than point a large neon sign at the cinematographer that says “Look how creative he is being!”  A film is successful when it can completely submerge the audience in the story for the entire duration, without ever once drawing attention to its technique.  In this, Ladder 49 stumbles along the way.

The film has been picked on for being melodramatic, for glamorizing firemen, and for sensationalizing their jobs.  Yes, I’m sure there is some grandstanding, like the way a majestic and triumphant musical composition accompanies Jack’s first fire.  I doubt the people whose possessions were being burned to a crisp were feeling quite so roused and patriotic.  But with the way many of these people put their lives on the line to keep the rest of the community safe, I think a little grandstanding is certainly permissible.

So I feel the overall viewing experience is a good one.  And it is a good reminder to us that our towns, our cities, our quality of life would not survive were it not for public servants like firemen.  Someday soon I’m going to take him to the local fire station and let him see the men responsible for putting out fires in our area.  So that he will know who they are, so that he will never be cynical enough to ask, “Who cares?”

And so I can get a picture of him in one of those huge hats.

Artistry: 8
Entertainment: 8