Respond to these rapid questions in our Adrift quiz and we will tell you which Adrift character you are. Play it now.
A 44-foot yacht was chartered in September 1983, and Tami Oldham Ashcraft and her fiancé, Richard Sharp, were hired to make the 4,000-mile voyage from Tahiti to San Diego, California. They encountered Hurricane Raymond, a tropical storm that had been building in strength for a couple of weeks when they were about halfway through their trans-Pacific journey. They struggled to keep the yacht under control in 145-knot winds, and Sharp was washed overboard and drowned in the mountainous ocean. A head injury caused Ashcraft to lose consciousness, and the yacht sustained significant damage; however, she managed to repair it and navigate her way to Hawaii, manually, using a sextant and keeping watch over 1,500 miles. It took her an incredible 41 days to complete the task. She was able to survive solely on peanut butter. Red Sky in Mourning: A True Story of Love, Loss, and Survival at Sea was published in 2002, and it is based on Ashcraft’s personal experience. Adrift, the film adaptation directed by Baltasar Kormákur, is a heartfelt piece of work that doesn’t hold back on its emotions. What makes this story unique is that it is more than just a story of incredible survival. As a love story, it is delivered with the blunt force of a sledgehammer, as well.
In Tahiti, when Richard (Sam Claflin) and Tami (Shailene Woodley) first meet, she’s working in a marina, already feeling “adrift” but not particularly concerned about it, and he’s a yacht-owner who wants to sail around the world. Jumping off cliffs, random laughter, and a conversation about flowers are all part of their love story. Aside from that, there’s not much substance to it, and the script (written by Aaron and Jordan Kandell, as well as David Branson Smith—apparently, there wasn’t a single female writer within a 4,000-mile radius who contributed to this story of a woman stranded at sea) is devoid of subtext. The two express themselves honestly (“I sailed halfway around the world to find you”), and the music builds in intensity as if on cue. All of this is fairly standard fare, and it’s entirely forgivable in the end. In a film like this, no one is looking for subtlety in the dynamics of their relationship. The storm is what we’re looking forward to.
Tami is found injured in the yacht’s interior following a storm, and the film begins with her lying there. The cabin is suffocating from the excess water and debris. When she finally makes it to the deck, she discovers Richard’s safety line dangling over the side of the boat. She believes she can see Richard, who she believes is floating on a dinghy in the distance. Her determination to reach him drives her to repair the yacht to the best of her ability, pumping water out of the cabin and mending the sail as best she can. Eventually, she makes it to the dinghy, where she drags the injured Richard back to the boat, where she somehow (Kormákur does not show us how) pulls him up the ladder onto the deck with an almost superhuman effort. His ribs have collapsed, and his leg has been severely injured. Because this is a true story, we know that Richard was swept away from the boat and will never be seen or heard from again. There is some confusion as to whether they have decided to fictionalize the story or whether she is experiencing some kind of sustained hallucination at the time.
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“Adrift” alternates between Tami and Richard’s budding romance on Tahiti and the increasingly dire situation they find themselves in following the storm. Tami is determined to keep herself and Richard alive. She is the one who makes the decision to turn north and attempt to reach Hawaii, rather than continuing on to San Diego as originally planned. It is she who is in charge of rationing the food. When problems arise, she is responsible for finding solutions. She hovers over maps, peering through the sextant, and making calculations, all while battling dehydration and exhaustion (and possibly a lingering concussion from her head injury). Many similarities exist between “Adrift” and “All Is Lost,” the 2013 film starring Robert Redford, but there are some significant differences. “All Is Lost” is the only film in which Redford appears. There is no exchange of words. He doesn’t converse with himself, so we don’t get a glimpse into his thought process. There is no “Wilson” in this film, as there was in “Cast Away,” a device that allowed the stranded character to express his feelings. It is set in a vast and eerie silence for the majority of “All Is Lost.” Our knowledge of the character is limited; we don’t understand why he’s out there by himself, and we don’t know anything about his life on land. All we get to see is him struggling to make it through another day, step by harrowing step. “Adrift” steers clear of many of the difficulties that “All Is Lost” encounters head-on.
Adrift Quiz
Kormákur is drawn to stories about extraordinary feats of survival (such as “Everest” and “The Deep”), and the sea and its storms play a prominent role in his writing (much of which takes place in his home country, Iceland). He’s back on familiar ground. In “Adrift,” cinematographer Robert Richardson, who has worked with directors such as Quentin Tarantino, Martin Scorsese, and Oliver Stone, does fantastic work. The frequent aerial shots of the tiny yacht surrounded by vast ocean are chilling: the frame appears to be almost completely devoid of any life or meaning. There’s a dizzying scene in Tahiti where Tami and Richard jump off a cliff into a deep pool below, and it appears as though Richardson is perched out in mid-air beside the cliff beside them (and when Richard jumps, the camera follows him all the way down). The sunsets are ablaze with vibrant colors, and the yacht in black silhouette is visible in the foreground.
Also, you will find out which character are you in this Adrift quiz.
This must have been a very demanding shoot for everyone involved, and Kormákur has maintained remarkable control over the images throughout the process. Even though they’re filming in the middle of the ocean, the shots are consistent: the weather, the sky, the height and dip of the waves in any given sequence are all the same throughout. When the storm finally arrives, it is a spectacular piece of filmmaking and special effects work to witness. Tami Ashcraft was asked about whether or not the storm depicted in the film adaptation of “The Perfect Storm” was an accurate representation of what a storm like this actually looked like in an interview when her book was first released. “There wasn’t enough spray, and the wall of water was a little gimmicky,” she explained. The storm in “Adrift” is anything but cheesy or melodramatic (Dadi Einarsson supervised the visual effects). A roiling ocean is visible throughout the screen as the yacht surfs up a mountain of water on its way up the side of a mountain of water. There’s no sky in sight, just massive waves the size of three-story buildings crashing against the shore. As a result, the air is filled with spray that splashes against the camera, indicating that they paid attention to Ashcraft. It’s a complete mess. Screaming nightmares have come to life in this entire situation.
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There’s little chemistry between the two actors, who aren’t given much information about the characters they’re playing in terms of personality. It’s difficult to “believe in” the Great Love that is being “sold” here. But stories like these, stories like “Touching the Void” or “And I Alone Survived,” hold a certain allure for readers. Indeed, it is awe-inspiring to see what human beings will go to in order to survive when faced with a Mother Nature who appears to have a personal stake in their demise. It causes you to ponder, “What strategies would I use to deal with such difficulties? Would I be able to come up with as many ideas as Tami? Or would I give up and give up?”Also, you must try to play this Adrift quiz.
For more personality quizzes check this: The Spy Who Dumped Me Quiz.
