The Rig



There’s a hurricane headed their way, so a handful of experienced members of a small oil rig are left to batten down the hatches and wait out the storm. After all, it’s only supposed to be a small storm, and it isn’t anything they haven’t gone through before. But just recently while they were drilling a new hole, they lost contact with their camera when something appeared to crash into it. Everyone thought it was just a fish, but as the storm rages outside and the members of the crew start getting picked off one by one, they quickly realize that they may have disturbed something far more deadly. With their communication severed and no way off the rig until the storm passes, the roughnecks will have to band together if they want to figure out a way to survive.



Hello, everyone. Pardon me for a moment, won’t you? Ahem…

ARUGH!

…. Thank you. Just had to get that out of my system.

Anyway, The Rig is an American sci-fi/horror/action flick from 2010, and is one of those films that is made just competently enough for you to know that there was at least some level of skill behind it, but is otherwise so cringe-y that you also can’t quite figure out HOW those semi-skilled people managed to get any funding for it. Especially when you consider that this looks like a cheap-y ass movie that must have aired on something like the SYFY channel. Except it didn’t (miraculously), so it didn’t even have their low-budget movie money to work with. Which means that the filmmakers had to get their own funding for this film and they must have had one of the  greatest pitch-man EVER working for them (and no one supplying them funds ever read the script), because otherwise I don’t know how else they talked people into this.



But before I get into complaining too much, as there is plenty to complain about, I’ll be nice and point out what the film did right-

Shockingly, the blood and boob fans may end up being slightly amused by this film. Emphasis on slightly. There are at least three scenes of, albeit, brief nudity, including one with two very incompatible people macking in the shower while people die a few rooms away. So I guess the movie was able to fill it’s self-imposes skin and guilt quota in one fell swoop.

Also quite surprisingly, this film has a lot of blood and guts on display. Like, A LOT. And unlike what you might expect from a low-budget film from 2010, the powers that be here used actual, physical goo and blood splatter, and not a bunch of cringe-y CGI garbage. And believe it or not, most of it looks like actual blood too, not just a bunch of cheap red tempera paint they flung around the set. So say what you will about the rest of the film, but at least they were smart enough to put some of their money to good use. It may not always look great, but it’s real, and I am very appreciative for at least this minor effort on their part.



And finally, the movie was filmed almost entirely on location on ‘Mr. Charlie’, an actual, honest-to-god decommissioned oil rig off the coast of Morgan City, Louisiana. It was in service from 1954-86, and is now currently a museum. Point being, they actually shot The Rig on a rig, so I’ll give them some bonus points for being able to shoot their film ‘on location’ and for not making me have to squint through scenes of actors walking around ‘sets’ that are clearly poorly implemented green screens like I was half expecting, after having sat through all those Full Moon films recently. So…don’t know how they managed that, but bravo for small mercies.



Now, the problems the film has relate to just about everything else. To the point where honestly, I… I don’t quite know where to start. Uh…. The acting, for the most part, varies from passable to kinda cringe-y. The film’s headliner is William Forsythe. How they got him involved, I don’t know. But I assume he only worked for about a day, because he’s not the hero and is only in the movie for probably less than 10 minutes. And the only other really recognizable face is that of Art LeFleur, who played A TON of side characters in TV and movies from the 70s all the way through the 2010s, so a lot of viewers will have probably seen him in something. So those two guys are okay, but they were also barely in the movie, so that really doesn’t amount to much. Everyone else’s resume though, half of them look like they have a lot of equally questionable films and 1 TV episode credits to their name. And the other half also have that, but also apparently had recurring television roles on shows like Undressed, General Hospital, Wizards of Waverly Place, and Moesha (now there’s a series I haven’t heard of in forever)? But none of these are shows I watched, so I don’t recognize them. But (!), some of them were even nominated and given awards and shit for some of their other work. But I guarantee you probably wouldn’t know it from watching this movie, because here…well…a lot of them kinda suck. Sorry, guys.



In their defense though, they really didn’t have much to work with, because the script for this film is downright awful. The dialogue, for one, is terrible, so really the poor actors were doomed from the start. But it’s really the story that’s constantly shooting itself in the foot. You can tell the writers (yes, plural, there were three) knew just enough to make the story plausible, but not enough to make it believable. Meaning it’s another one of those movies that’s trying to mimic other movies and piecemeal a similar plot together, but it’s clear that they really don’t know why those plots worked in the first place. As a result, there’s a ton of holes in the plot and character motivations to make them painfully annoying enough to take you out of the film. There’s a sibling rivalry subplot that’s clearly there as an attempt to trigger your sentimentality. But because the brothers only spend about 2 minutes interacting with one another, only for one to be basically forgotten about for 90% of the movie, not only does it feel forced, but naturally it falls completely flat. There’s a guy who keeps moping about why the boss-man doesn’t seem to like him, while simultaneously trying to boink the guy’s daughter (gee, did you ever think that might have had something to do with it, smart guy?). There’s a spunky, strong Puerto Rican chick who acts all bad-ass and is clearly a poor-man’s attempt at recreating Vasquez from Aliens. And you can really tell they’re channeling her, because at one point she mocks the communications guy for being a chicken, as if some skinny ass dude who took IT courses knows shit-all about battling blood-thirsty sea creatures. Like, seriously lady, neither of you have guns or know what the hell to do in this situation, so maybe shut the hell up.



One of my favorite ones though, is the ex-marine guy named Faulkner. Faulkner, upon learning that a creature is trying to kill them, suddenly decides everyone else is a pathetic weakling and he’s the world’s most mighty hunter or some shit. So he goes off alone to kill the creatures, because I guess he must have bumped his head somewhere along the way or something and now he thinks he’s that game warden guy in the first Jurassic Park film. And yes, his sudden bout of stupidity ends exactly the same way that situation did (exactly!), so not only are his actions dumb, but the outcome is also predictable.



Moreover, it’s clear that none of the writers had ever worked on a rig, or in any kind of industrial setting, because it doesn’t take long for the characters to seemingly ignore basic safety procedures that not only would have gotten them reprimanded, but also quite possibly fired. Not to mention the fact that in a dangerous industrial environment like a rig, there would likely be multiple first aid kits on each floor, and everything wouldn’t be held in the med clinic that they end up having to run to that is conveniently on the other side of the rig.


All right! Let’s aimlessly wander around to that random room that’s nowhere near us!

Which brings up another issue: why the hell is everything the roughnecks need always on the other side of the rig? I mean, I know the reason. They needed an excuse to pad out the damn film. But goodness gracious, did watching them almost constantly having to run down multiple hallways to get something get really old, really fast. And to make it worse, every time they did it, their actions ended up being pointless about five seconds later.

“Oh, we have a gun! But it’s in a box and we need the key!”
“It’s in my dad’s office!”
“Let’s go!”
*gets key*
*acquires gun*
TWO SCENES LATER
*shoots creature with six bullets*
*discards gun* (translation: throws gun down like a toddler because it ran out of bullets)
*creature gets back up as if nothing happened*

So, basically what you’re telling me, movie, is that we’ve just spent 10 minutes worrying about a gun that ends up getting used in about 3 seconds, and is then immediately discarded and forgotten about for the rest of the movie? Gee, thanks. Talk about an epic bloody waste of screen-time. And don’t even get me started on the damn injection that they ran across the rig to get for their wounded coworker, only to forget the bandages they also needed to get him (they literally shrugged when asked about them), inject the guy, and then have him die literal seconds later because his caring friends decided to shove him out the door first, as if he was some human meat shield. Meaning we just wasted another 5 useless minutes watching people run through the same woodgrain-lined corridors again for no reason. But that’s fine, movie. Whatever helps you pad out the runtime, I guess!


I felt so bad for this guy. I swear, everyone around him SUCKED.

“But wait,” I theoretically hear you ask, “What about the creature? If they did okay with the blood and junk, at least tell me the creature design was cool.” And to you, gentle reader, I say: be prepared for disappointment. That GIANT creature on all the posters that looks like it’s about to eat the whole rig? That doesn’t exist. I’m not even sure where that image comes from. No, the creatures look nothing like that. And while the movie may be trying to imitate Aliens, the monster really doesn’t look anything like that either. Instead, it kinda looks like a cross between the alien/hybrid from Species and a Sleestak from that Land of the Lost show from the 70s. Except it’s only about 3-4ft tall, so it’s like an, er, mini Species-Sleestak? A Spleestak? I don’t know. You don’t really have to worry too much about its design though, because unless you pause the movie juuuuust right, you’re not really going to be able to see it. Because this thing is either perpetually basked in shadow, or the film is edited so choppily that you’re only ever given minor glimpses of pieces of it. So I suspect between the lack of clarity and the fake out posters, that the filmmakers may not have been all that thrilled with its design or implementation.


I mean, you can KINDA see it?

So…um… You know, I usually try to think of something nice to say at the end here, but this one is pretty bad. And dull, I’m sorry to say. Yeah, there’s boobs and blood and they shot on location, but that’s… That’s really it. And even considering that, there’s nothing there that’s really impressive enough to recommend this. If you like low-budget horror films you can consider this one of those “challenge” films, because it is pretty entertaining in that regard, and relatively watchable. But the vast majority of you will probably want to steer clear of The Rig.

The Rig is available on a variety of streaming services.

The Rig is also available on DVD and Bluray. 

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