Like its main characters, this movie is at its best on the sea. This film’s location, the fishing community of New Bedford, Massachusetts, is where writer/director Brian Helgeland, grew up, and like its characters, he worked on a boat that collected deep sea scallops over 100 miles offshore for two weeks at a time.Before we see anything, we hear the sounds of the ocean, the calls of the birds, the splashes of the waves. We can almost smell the salt in the air. Then we see Tom (Ben Foster) on the dock. He is, as he will be throughout the story, metaphorically between the freedom and clarity of the open sea and the constraints found on land, the complications of family obligations and conflicts with the rules imposed by bosses and politicians and girlfriends and money.Finestkind 2023 Full Movie Download
We learn quickly that for Tom, life has only two parts: being on the water and waiting to go back on the water. It is another world, the horizon disappearing as the sky and the water blend together. Under the boat, there are whales.
Tom, like other characters in the movie, has a view about what it means to be a man. In his mind, the ideal of masculinity is being as free as possible from all constraints except those of the natural world. There is some mild hazing of newcomers, but there is an instant bond with anyone who chooses to be on the water. There are men in the story who work in offices and wear ties. They are seen by the sea-going characters as lesser individuals who are not willing to take on the hard, physical work suitable for men. The point of view of Helgeland understands guy-talk, meaning dialogue that is brief, sardonic, elliptical, as far as possible from any kind of emotion or vulnerability. “Not dead yet,” is all they say when they’ve been rescued from a near-fatal accident at sea, without a hint of grimness.