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Big Miracle (PG)

Drama, Romance

In small town Alaska, a news reporter recruits his ex-girlfriend - a Greenpeace volunteer - on a campaign to save a family of gray whales trapped by rapidly forming ice in the Arctic Circle.


The critical consensus

This true-life tale takes some believing in the era of global warming (too much ice? Really?) but the sledgehammer emoting should let you know you're in a family drama.

**(*)(*)(*)Olly Richards, Empire Online, 06/02/2012

“You’re not as easy to hate as I thought!” Barrymore says to Danson. Those initially resistant to Big Miracle may reach the same conclusion.

***(*)(*)Neil Smith, Total Film, 03/02/2012

The picture is gripping, funny and uplifting with some lively characters.

***(*)(*)Henry Fitzherbert, Daily Express, 08/02/2012

Kwapis's family drama milks everything he can from the whales' predicament, which leads to a film as long as a Scottish winter.

***(*)(*)Alison Rowat, The Herald, 09/02/2012

This race-against-time, save-the-whales adventure is, ironically, a lot more concerned with the personal and political squabbling inhibiting the efforts to rescue three grey whales trapped by ice on the fringes of the Arctic Circle than it is with the whales themselves.

**(*)(*)(*)Alistair Harkness, The Scotsman, 09/02/2012

A peculiar mix of cynicism and sentimentality.

***(*)(*)Martyn Conterio, Little White Lies, 09/02/2012

Delivers slightly more than its minuscule promise.

**(*)(*)(*)Anthony Quinn, The Independent, 10/02/2012

The movie plays like some uncynical, credulous version of Wag the Dog, in which we are all expected to get behind the sugary good-news story and endorse the good faith of the politicians and big-oil hombres who did their darnedest to set the whales free.

**(*)(*)(*)Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian, 09/02/2012

Recalling no doubt that Ace in the Hole was the biggest box-office disaster of Billy Wilder's career, the makers attempt to coat their fascinatingly bitter pill with saccharine. They are, however, only partially successful.

Philip French, The Observer, 12/02/2012


Features about Big Miracle (PG)

Drew Barrymore saves the whales and melts cold war ice in Big Miracle

John Vidal, The Guardian, 09/02/2012

Big Miracle (PG)

Where and when?

General release. Check local listings for show times.

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