Movie Review
Russell Crowe shows he's 'Master' of the high seas

By Moira Macdonald
Seattle Times movie critic

	STEPHEN VAUGHAN Russell Crowe plays Capt. Jack Aubrey of the British Navy in "Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World."
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Russell Crowe swaggers marvelously in the seafaring adventure "Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World." As Capt. Jack Aubrey of the British Navy, he has a masterful manner combined with a light touch; he lets us see how this man loves the sea. He grins while peering into a telescope; he congratulates young crew members upon their first skirmish. "Now tell me that wasn't fun," he says to them conspiratorially, a knowing member of a brotherhood.

Based on a popular series of historical novels by Patrick O'Brian, and set during the Napoleonic Wars, "Master and Commander" takes its audience on a bracing journey. (This is one to see on the biggest screen you can possibly find; you'll practically feel the drops of water.) Director Peter Weir — whose last film, "The Truman Show," featured a tantalizingly brief boating scene — makes the sea into a character; its surface rippling like the iridescent scales on a blue-gray fish. And when an enemy boat appears on the horizon, emerging from the fog like a lone lamppost on a dark night, it's as ominous an adversary as any black-clad villain.

Movie review Showtimes and trailer **** "Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World," with Russell Crowe, Paul Bettany, Billy Boyd, James D'Arcy, Lee Ingleby, George Innes, Mark Lewis Jones. Directed by Peter Weir, from a screenplay by Weir and John Collee, based on the novels by Patrick O'Brian. 138 minutes. Rated PG-13 for intense battle sequences, related images and brief language. Several theaters.

But "Master and Commander" isn't so much about battle — though its combat scenes are vivid and thrilling — than about the creation of a community on Aubrey's ship. "This little wooden world," as Aubrey calls it, is their homeland in miniature; a careful class system is maintained. And it's a story of friendship between two very different men: Aubrey and Stephen Maturin (Paul Bettany), the ship's doctor and resident naturalist. They're near-opposites, and yet get along famously. Both are musicians, whiling away quiet hours by playing duets, creating a delicate dance in the air.

Crowe and Bettany previously shared a screen in "A Beautiful Mind," and their easy chemistry (they've got the same slightly droll quality to their smiles) carries over to Weir's movie intact. Maturin is something of a loner on the ship; he's a non-sailor frequently puzzled by what goes on. At one point, the ship sways and seamen suddenly cheer. Peering through his wire-rimmed glasses, Maturin notes dryly that "clearly something nautical and fascinating has occurred"; clearly he doesn't much care what.

Crowe's performance here is simpler than much of his recent movie work; he doesn't have the neuroses of John Nash ("A Beautiful Mind") or the haunted quality of his characters in "Gladiator" and "The Insider." It's not that Aubrey isn't complicated — he's determined to win at all costs, and hints at a romantic side that's carefully hidden here — but that Crowe's so completely at home in his skin. His acting seems effortless; perhaps he's a born captain.

In a late scene, he brushes off Maturin's gratitude with a gruff, "Name a shrub after me ... something prickly, and hard to eradicate."

And Weir, the Australian master of vaguely menacing atmosphere ("Picnic at Hanging Rock," "Witness," "The Truman Show"), creates an intricate world-within-a-world for him; it's as if we're peering through a spyglass. Director of photography Russell Boyd, who shot many of Weir's early films, gives the night scenes a believable darkness; there's no Hollywood glamour lighting here, just indistinct faces and cannon fire blooming orange in the gray clouds.

A ship, Weir finds, is something like a movie — everything happens with an audience gathered round to watch. (Maturin performs surgeries while answering questions from a curious gallery.) And in the end, as the camera pulls away, we see the H.M.S. Surprise become a dot on a rippling sea, a tiny puzzle-piece in a bigger world, leaving this audience behind, sailing toward another adventure.

Moira Macdonald: 206-464-2725 or mmacdonald@seattletimes.com

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