Dark Waters

Dark Waters

Starring Mark Ruffalo, Anne Hathaway, Tim Robbins, Bill Camp

Directed by Todd Haynes

There's countless movies about the little guy who stands up against the big giant and wins easily, those type of films where we have an underdog to root for and who manages to overcome seemingly impossible odds to end up on top.  These are great movies to cheer on, especially when it's based on a real life underdog who takes on an unstoppable giant - even if it proves that real lives don't always have happy endings.

Robert Bilott (Mark Ruffalo) is an attorney who represents major corporations, and one of them is the DuPont chemical company.  He's living the high life, just being promoted by his head boss Tom Terp (Tim Robbins), and his wife Sarah (Anne Hathaway) just delivered a baby boy.  All is going well for him until he's visited by a West Virginian farmer named Wilbur Tennant (Bill Camp), who believes that DuPont is poisoning the water supply and killing his hundreds of cattle.  Robert investigates, and at first doesn't seem to believe it - especially as he's befriended by DuPont president Phil Donnelly (Victor Garber).  But as the evidence begins to mount, Robert believes that DuPont really did intentionally poison the water supply and unleashed a deadly, unstoppable chemical known as PFOA (or C8) that can't be destroyed in the human body and leads to different kinds of illness including cancer.  As he takes on DuPont, he threatens his livelihood, his family's fortune, and even his life all in search of the truth.

Director Todd Haynes has a way of bringing to life the struggles of the unsung minorities: be it sexism ("Mildred Pierce"), racism ("Far From Heaven"), or homophobia ("Carol") - he delivers the stories of the unknown.  "Dark Waters" adds to this collection by telling the story of a real-life man who goes against one of the biggest corporations in the world - a war that Bilott seemingly has no hope of winning.  The film does well in portraying Bilott as the little guy: giving him clothes that make him look like he has no neck and therefore turtle-like, shooting the film almost entirely in a darker blue hue that seeps in despair, or even showcasing the ravages of time as the case sits on the backburner for over a decade.  You see the toll it takes on Robert - his longsuffering wife feels he's not even there, he has his own physical medical issues, and his boss is constantly berating him for carrying on the case.  This isn't an epic battle where people are cheering on the good guy, but rather one where the good guy is standing alone against a giant, and you even wonder if it's worth it at all.

Mark Ruffalo plays the everyman with exceptional grace and dignity, and gives Robert Bilott his due diligence as he tirelessly searches for the truth and stands against the evil corporation even as he's bombarded with a basement full of records, vague threats, and a crumbling family life.  Anyone who's read the news will know how this turns out, so it's no big spoiler to say that he's eventually successful, but we see the toll it takes on him and his family, and even the victory is clouded by issues that leads to a powerful revelation by Bilott near the end of the film -  no one is out to take care of you: not big corporations, not the judicial system, and not the government, but you are on your own when it comes to your personal health.  While some may think that's depressing, it's also a freeing thought: you're in control of your own destiny, and you shouldn't rely on big government to take care of you.

The film's story may seem dull and dry, but Haynes manages to make even the most mundane things seem epic in scale with his cinematography, score, and actors.  When Robert is in the basement of his firm shifting through countless boxes of files, you're actually on the edge of your seat in anticipation of what he'd find.  When he's interviewing a big-wig of DuPont, your heart is palpitating with excitement as Bilott slowly unravels the truth.  It's surprisingly exciting, but there's also moments where the film falters in its storytelling and resorts to the formulaic format of such films like this, and would've been better if some parts were cut out.  Still, it's a deeply intriguing premise performed brilliantly, leaving you thinking twice about what's going into your body.

With a very capable performance by Mark Ruffalo, "Dark Waters" sheds light on the evils of greedy corporations and the lengths they go to in order to make a buck, even at the cost of the environment - and especially human lives.

The Score: A