COMMENT

Inspired by a true story, the rescue adventure Big Miracle tells the amazing tale of an animal-loving volunteer (Drew Barrymore) and a small-town news reporter (John Krasinski), who are joined by a native Alaskan boy (newcomer Ahmaogak Sweeney) to rally an entire community—and eventually rival world superpowers—to save a family of majestic gray whales trapped by rapidly forming ice in the Arctic Circle.

Barrow newsman Adam Carlson (Krasinski) can’t wait to escape the northern tip of Alaska for a bigger market. But just when the story of his career breaks, the world comes chasing it too. With an oil tycoon, heads of state and hungry journalists descending upon the frigid outpost to get their moment in the midnight sun, the one person who occupies Adam the most is Rachel Kramer (Barrymore). Not only is she an outspoken environmentalist, she also happens to be his ex-girlfriend.

With time running out, Rachel, Adam and Nathan (Sweeney), an 11-year-old native Alaskan boy who learns to connect with his people and his culture, must rally an unlikely coalition of locals, oil companies and Russian and American military to set aside their differences and unite for a purpose they all believe in: freeing the whales in record time. As the Alaskans frantically try to dig miles of holes on one side of the ice and a Soviet icebreaker pushes inland on the other, they must perform the virtually impossible to bridge a four-mile gap. And if they miraculously succeed, the trapped whales will be freed to the safety of open sea to begin their 5,000-mile annual migration.

As the world’s attention turns to the top of the globe for two weeks, saving these endangered animals becomes a shared cause for nations entrenched against one another and leads to an unexpected, momentary thaw in the Cold War.

Directed by Ken Kwapis (He’s Just Not That Into You, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants) from a screenplay by Jack Amiel and Michael Begler, based on the book “Freeing the Whales” by journalist Thomas Rose.

In 1988, the lack of cell phones, online social networks and instant wireless meant that news didn’t move as fast as it does today.  But as cable television and satellite transmissions found wider audiences, the world was realizing that information no longer resided wholly in morning papers or on the nightly newscasts of the three major networks.

Into this new era came stories we could watch around the clock. And for three California gray whales that became trapped off the coast of Barrow, Alaska, during their annual migration in October of that year, this was helpful news indeed. One onlooker of the unfolding rescue was journalist Thomas Rose, whose book “Freeing the Whales” was published in 1989.

Rose’s story, originally released as an article in the now defunct Spy magazine and later lengthened into book form, chronicled the events surrounding the tremendous rescue effort on behalf of the three ice-locked gray whales off the shores of Barrow. When a local news photographer sent video coverage of the animals breaching in a small breathing hole hewn from thick ice, footage found its way from the bureau desk in Anchorage all the way to NBC anchor Tom Brokaw’s national evening newscast.

Soon, the plight of the whales captured international interest and resulted in a media frenzy that overtook the small city. The residents of the northernmost—and perhaps coldest—town in America were inundated with press. For a sleepy whaling town coming to grips with a changing way of life, this would be one of the biggest mixed blessings to present itself all century.

But it wasn’t just the Fourth Estate that had a vested interest in this human-interest tale. The story caught the attention of the Reagan White House, then focused upon the upcoming November election campaign of Vice President George H.W. Bush.

Looking to position Bush as a pro-environment candidate and engage the federal government in the humanitarian effort, the Reagan team enlisted the aid of staffer Bonnie Mersinger, the executive assistant for cabinet affairs, in its efforts.

“President Reagan stopped by my office in the West Wing that night,” recalls Bonnie Mersinger Carroll, technical advisor for Big Miracle. “He had seen that the National Guard was involved, and he wondered what the White House could do to help. Since I was also a Guardsman, he asked that I extend his offer of help to the Alaska National Guard. And that’s how I met Tom Carroll.”

Col. Tom Carroll was serving as commander of one of the major battalions of the Alaska National Guard when he received a barrage of phone calls from Mersinger. Although initially put in charge of moving a behemoth hoverbarge across the ice, Carroll soon found his mission to be impossible and called the White House to request that President Reagan contact Soviet General Secretary Gorbachev to request the use of a Soviet icebreaker for the rescue of the pod of whales.

“This was before the Berlin Wall came down,” says Mersinger Carroll, “so this contact between America and the Soviet Union would prove extraordinary. It was a step toward world peace at the time.”

Little did Mersinger and Carroll know that their many phone calls would spark a romance between the two, who later married. According to Mersinger Carroll: “Tom saw an opportunity to bring together the military, Alaska natives, oil companies, Greenpeace and even the Soviets. He was quite at the center of what became a miraculous operation in cooperation.”

Sadly, several years later, then Brigadier General Carroll was killed—along with seven other soldiers—in an Army National Guard plane crash in the wilds of his beloved Alaska.

From this experience, Mersinger Carroll went on to form the national organization Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors (TAPS), a front line partner with the Defense Department offering comfort and care to the families of America’s fallen military heroes.

In 1992, Rose’s tale of sensationalism, camaraderie and humanity caught the attention of fledgling television writers Jack Amiel and Michael Begler. Though curious about the story in ’88, their attentions were then elsewhere. “My sister, Andrea, was working for Dan Rather at CBS News,” recalls Amiel.

“She thought the story would spark our interest as the basis for a film, although Michael and I were focused on writing for television at the time.”

The screenwriters kept Rose’s story on the back burner and revisited it in 2001, when they were establishing themselves as feature-film writers. They purchased the rights to his book and renewed them for nearly a decade as they wrote drafts of the script.

“Our source material was Rose’s book and the news footage of the time,” adds Begler. “But a lot of what we wrote was very real. We had to embellish and create new characters to form the story, but we wanted to stay consistent with what really happened for two long weeks out on the ice in 1988.”

The fact that two of the whales were eventually freed and returned to the open ocean made the story an overwhelming media favorite. Topping it off was the realization that—in an unprecedented thaw in the Cold War above the Arctic Circle—two superpowers put aside their differences and worked together for the good of the mission.

“The American icebreakers had all been waylaid or placed in dry dock by October,” explains Begler, “so the Soviet ship was the only one available. The use of the Soviet ship was a big gesture from the Reagan administration and the Gorbachev government.  Cooperation also made them both look good to a watching and waiting world.”

Director Ken Kwapis, who guided films such as He’s Just Not That Into You and The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants into big hits, came aboard the project and helped to shape its story line. “We very much had a satirical media focus in the first drafts,” remembers Amiel.

“Ken brought a vision with him that added a kindness and humanity to the story. We opened it up and brought in other characters and points of view.” The actual events of 1988 were not burnished in Kwapis’ mind, but he viewed the story as an opportunity to show the rescue from multiple perspectives. “I was very surprised to find out what a fuss these three whales caused,” he says. “Our story covers the media circus that descended upon the trapped whales, but its main focus is the unlikely coalition of rescuers that put aside their various agendas in order to accomplish an impossible task.”

The writers took the screenplay to the principals of their management company Anonymous Content, Steve Golin and Michael Sugar, who also helped to shape it.

Eventually, both came onto the project as producers, alongside Tim Bevan and Eric Fellner, co-chairmen of the feature’s production company, Working Title Films.

“Michael brought the script to my attention,” recalls Golin. “I felt like this could be a movie about people working for common goals, even if they did not agree philosophically. Ken understood that tone of the film. He brought a sense of humor and an everyman touch, while also seeing it as a moving, emotional and inspirational story.”

Although Rose’s book dates back to the late 1980s, Sugar believed that Amiel and Begler’s script could have been drawn from today’s headlines. “We thought that given what was happening in the world at the time, this story would resonate well in the present,” says Sugar. “Even though it is several years old, it is relevant as a story of modern humanity and shows the spirit of change.