''After the Storm'' is a 2001 American adventure film starring

Benjamin Bratt Benjamin Bratt (born December 16, 1963) is an American actor. He is known for playing Paco Aguilar in '' Blood in Blood Out''. He had supporting film roles in the 1990s in ''Demolition Man'' (1993), ''Clear and Present Danger'' (1994) and '' ...

, Mili Avital, Armand Assante, and Simone-Élise Girard. The story centers around the efforts of a group of people to salvage valuables from a sunken

yacht A yacht () is a sail- or marine propulsion, motor-propelled watercraft made for pleasure, cruising, or racing. There is no standard definition, though the term generally applies to vessels with a cabin intended for overnight use. To be termed a ...

in the

Bahamas The Bahamas, officially the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, is an archipelagic and island country within the Lucayan Archipelago of the Atlantic Ocean. It contains 97 per cent of the archipelago's land area and 88 per cent of its population. ...

in 1933 and their schemes to betray and double-cross one another. The film is based on the 1933 short story "After the Storm" by

Ernest Hemingway Ernest Miller Hemingway ( ; July 21, 1899 – July 2, 1961) was an American novelist, short-story writer and journalist. Known for an economical, understated style that influenced later 20th-century writers, he has been romanticized fo ...

with a

screenplay A screenplay, or script, is a written work produced for a film, television show (also known as a '' teleplay''), or video game by screenwriters (cf. ''stage play''). Screenplays can be original works or adaptations from existing pieces of w ...

by A. E. Hotchner. Originally intended for theatrical release, it instead was broadcast as a television film in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

on the

USA Network USA Network (or simply USA) is an American basic cable television channel owned by the NBCUniversal Media Group division of Comcast's NBCUniversal. It was launched in 1977 as Madison Square Garden Sports Network, one of the first national sports ...

Plot

Arno — a

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

veteran whose father followed Arno's advice to invest heavily in stocks and hanged himself after losing the family's money in the Wall Street Crash of 1929 — left everything behind after his mother also died soon afterward, taking with him only his father's expensive

pocket watch A pocket watch is a watch that is made to be carried in a pocket, as opposed to a wristwatch, which is strapped to the wrist. They were the most common type of watch from their development in the 16th century until wristwatches became popula ...

. He lives alone in a beachfront shack in the

with only a pet

parrot Parrots (Psittaciformes), also known as psittacines (), are birds with a strong curved beak, upright stance, and clawed feet. They are classified in four families that contain roughly 410 species in 101 genus (biology), genera, found mostly in ...

for company and ekes out a living as a beachcomber, travelling among the islands on his boat ''Caca de Toro'' and selling items he finds washed up on the beach. While in town one day in 1933, Arno discovers that Coquina, a woman he is attracted to, has returned from a three-year stay with her uncle on another island. Coquina's grandmother dislikes Arno and wishes Coquina to marry Thomas, a shopkeeper with greater financial security than the indebted and impoverished Arno, but Arno makes romantic overtures to Coquina, and a romantic relationship soon develops between them. Arno visits Janine, a married woman with whom he has a sexual relationship, and announces that their relationship is over. Arno also encounters Janine's husband Jean-Pierre, a Frenchman who operates a boat named ''La Chamade'' that he uses both for

marine salvage Marine salvage is the process of recovering a ship and its cargo after a shipwreck or other maritime casualty. Salvage may encompass towing, lifting a vessel, or effecting repairs to a ship. Salvors are normally paid for their efforts. Howev ...

work and to offer charter cruises as a

gigolo A gigolo ( ) is a male escort, call boy or social companion who is supported by a person in a continuing relationship. The term ''gigolo'' usually implies a man who adopts a lifestyle consisting of a number of such relationships serially rat ...

for wealthy female tourists. Aboard the ''La Chamade'' is Ortega, a shady associate of Arno's for whom Jean-Pierre often works. Ortega needs Arno's boat and knowledge of Cuban waters for an illegal voyage to

Cuba Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is an island country, comprising the island of Cuba (largest island), Isla de la Juventud, and List of islands of Cuba, 4,195 islands, islets and cays surrounding the main island. It is located where the ...

and offers Arno US$500 to work with him, but Arno dislikes Ortega and turns him down. Ortega approaches the corrupt local police chief, Sergeant Major Jim, and they concoct a plot to

blackmail Blackmail is a criminal act of coercion using a threat. As a criminal offense, blackmail is defined in various ways in common law jurisdictions. In the United States, blackmail is generally defined as a crime of information, involving a thr ...

Arno into working for Ortega. Aboard the ''Caca de Toro'', Arno comes across a

, the ''Pride of Chicago'', and is invited aboard. The yacht's owner, a rich American bootlegger, hires him to take a package to Bimini and the bootlegger's ailing wife asks him to pick up a package of medication for her as well while he is there. After Arno picks up her package on Bimini, one of Sergeant Major Jim's constables attempts to take it from him, but one of Arno's friends suddenly appears and assaults the constable, allowing Arno to escape just as a severe storm strikes. Arno seeks shelter in the bar and restaurant of a hotel. Sergeant Major Jim, Ortega, Janine, and Jean-Pierre all are there. Sergeant Major Jim seizes Arno's package, finds it contains

heroin Heroin, also known as diacetylmorphine and diamorphine among other names, is a morphinan opioid substance synthesized from the Opium, dried latex of the Papaver somniferum, opium poppy; it is mainly used as a recreational drug for its eupho ...

, and threatens Arno with arrest. Ortega intervenes, offering to pay Arno's

bail Bail is a set of pre-trial restrictions that are imposed on a suspect to ensure that they will not hamper the judicial process. Court bail may be offered to secure the conditional release of a defendant with the promise to appear in court when ...

if he will take the Cuba job Ortega is offering. A fight breaks out and Ortega pulls a knife, but Arno wrestles the knife away and stabs Ortega with it. Accused of killing Ortega, Arno escapes into the storm aboard the ''Caca de Toro''. He and his boat survive the storm, but he discovers the next morning that his father's watch has broken during the ordeal. Arno tries to find the ''Pride of Chicago'' to deliver the package he picked up on Bimini, but discovers that the yacht sank in the storm and lies upside down on the ocean bottom in shallow water. Through portholes, he sees the drowned bodies of women he had met aboard the yacht, still adorned with expensive jewelry. He lacks the

diving Diving most often refers to: * Diving (sport), the sport of jumping into deep water * Underwater diving, human activity underwater for recreational or occupational purposes Diving or Dive may also refer to: Sports * Dive (American football), ...

and salvage equipment necessary to enter the wreck and retrieve the jewelry. Determined to salvage valuables from the wreck before anyone else can, he returns to town and finds Coquina. The two of them steal diving equipment from Thomas's family and return to the wreck of the ''Pride of Chicago'', but the stolen equipment malfunctions and Arno almost drowns. Coquina saves him. Ortega, it turns out, suffered only a minor stab wound in his fight with Arno. He hires Jean-Pierre to find Arno and bring him in for a reward. Jean-Pierre has heard about US$1 million in

gold Gold is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol Au (from Latin ) and atomic number 79. In its pure form, it is a brightness, bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile metal. Chemically, gold is a transition metal ...

in a safe aboard the sunken ''Pride of Chicago'' and that a major search for her wreck has begun. Aboard the ''La Chamade'', Jean-Pierre and Janine soon find the ''Caca de Toro''. Arno and Jean-Pierre make a deal: Jean-Pierre — unable to dive due to

eardrum In the anatomy of humans and various other tetrapods, the eardrum, also called the tympanic membrane or myringa, is a thin, cone-shaped membrane that separates the external ear from the middle ear. Its function is to transmit changes in pres ...

damage — will not report the wanted Arno to the authorities or take him to Ortega and will provide diving and salvage equipment. In exchange, Arno will reveal the location of the ''Pride of Chicago'', do the diving to bring up valuables from the wreck, and agree to split the profits. Jean-Pierre does not tell Arno about the gold aboard the yacht or that Ortega is alive. Arno begins diving on the wreck and retrieving expensive jewelry from the bodies inside her hull, narrowly avoiding an attack by a

shark Sharks are a group of elasmobranch cartilaginous fish characterized by a ribless endoskeleton, dermal denticles, five to seven gill slits on each side, and pectoral fins that are not fused to the head. Modern sharks are classified within the ...

swimming inside the wreck. Arno and Jean-Pierre divide up the day's salvaged valuables that evening, hiding their shares so that neither can steal from the other. Arno and Coquina have sex, and afterwards he gives her his father's watch to wear around her neck. On his next dive, he makes his first attempt to enter the wreck and nearly suffocates when his air hose snags on the wreck; Coquina saves him again. Arno secretly keeps some of the salvaged jewelry for himself without letting Jean-Pierre know he had found it in the wreck, and he takes it to Sergeant Major Jim to bribe Jim to drop the murder charges he believes have been lodged against him. Jim accepts the bribe, then tells Arno that Ortega is alive and well. Arno returns to the ''La Chamade'' and accuses Jean-Pierre of lying to him about Ortega. A fight ensues, Arno throws Jean-Pierre overboard, and Arno pulls him back aboard only after Jean-Pierre informs him of the gold that is aboard the ''Pride of Chicago''. While Arno makes a night dive on the ''Pride of Chicago'', Jean-Pierre suggests to Coquina that Arno might betray her, take all the gold, and run off with Janine. He suggests that they double-cross Arno and Janine and split the profits with one another, and even that they could kill Arno by shutting off the

air compressor An air compressor is a machine that takes ambient air from the surroundings and discharges it at a higher pressure. It is an application of a gas compressor and a Pneumatics, pneumatic device that energy conversion, converts mechanical power (from ...

feeding him air during his dive. In the wreck, the shark attacks Arno; he escapes, but loses the

diving helmet A diving helmet is a rigid head enclosure with a breathing gas supply used in underwater diving. They are worn mainly by professional divers engaged in surface-supplied diving, though some models can be used with scuba equipment. The upper par ...

and

diving suit A diving suit is a garment or device designed to protect a diver from the underwater environment. A diving suit may also incorporate a breathing gas supply (such as for a standard diving dress or atmospheric diving suit), but in most cases th ...

. Arno and Jean-Pierre go ashore and procure explosives with which to blow the safe open and an open-bottomed

diving bell A diving bell is a rigid chamber used to transport divers from the surface to depth and back in open water, usually for the purpose of performing underwater work. The most common types are the open-bottomed wet bell and the closed bell, which c ...

that will make up for the loss of the diving helmet and suit by allowing Arno to catch breaths of air without having to come to the surface. While they are gone, Janine confides in Coquina, telling her that she plans to leave Jean-Pierre as soon as the salvage operation is over and that Coquina should be careful about Arno abandoning her, especially when she is older and less beautiful. When Arno and Jean-Pierre return, Coquina tells Arno that Jean-Pierre plans to steal his share, and Arno says that she should play along and that they will turn the tables on Jean-Pierre by stealing his share instead. Janine accompanies Arno in the diving bell on his next dive, a night dive in which he detonates the explosives to open the safe aboard the ''Pride of Chicago''. As he visits the diving bell to breathe, Janine proposes that they double-cross Coquina and Jean-Pierre, keep all the treasure for themselves, and run off together. Arno plays along and agrees with her. On the ''La Chamade'', Jean-Pierre asks Coquina to join him in double-crossing Arno and Janine; Coquina agrees to the double-cross. At the wreck, Arno and Janine recover the gold, but the shark returns and attacks Janine through the open bottom of the diving bell, killing her and swimming off with her body. Back aboard the ''La Chamade'', Jean-Pierre blames Arno for Janine's death, and Coquina appears to take Jean-Pierre's side. Ortega and one of his henchmen suddenly storm aboard and try to take all the salvaged valuables for themselves at gunpoint. In an effort to appease Ortega, Arno and Jean-Pierre both reveal the hiding places for their shares of the treasure aboard the ''La Chamade'', but a struggle ensues. Ortega stabs Arno in the shoulder but Jean-Pierre shoots both Ortega and his henchman, killing them. Coquina tells Arno that she sided with Jean-Pierre in the argument over Janine's death merely to play along with Jean-Pierre in his scheme to double-cross Arno. With Arno's knowledge, Coquina drugs Jean-Pierre so that she and Arno can flee with all the salvaged gold and treasure, but Arno wakes up the next morning to find that Coquina also drugged him, and that she has disappeared in a

skiff A skiff is any of a variety of essentially unrelated styles of small boats, usually propelled by sails or oars. Traditionally, these are coastal craft or river craft used for work, leisure, as a utility craft, and for fishing, and have a one-pers ...

, taking all the gold and jewels for herself. He laughs ironically when Sergeant Major Jim arrives on another boat to arrest Jean-Pierre and him for possession of the gold. Arno returns to his life as a beachcomber. One day he stops by the bar where he picks up his mail and receives a package. It contains his father's watch, which Coquina has had repaired and mailed back to him.

Cast

as Arno * Mili Avital as Coquina * Armand Assante as Jean-Pierre * Simone-Élise Girard as Janine * Nestor Serrano as Ortega *

Stephen Lang Stephen Lang (born July 11, 1952) is an American stage and screen actor. He gained fame for his role as main antagonist Miles Quaritch, Colonel Miles Quaritch in James Cameron's ''Avatar (2009 film), Avatar'' (2009), for which he won the Saturn ...

as Sergeant Major Jim

Screenplay

A. E. Hotchner, a playwright, novelist, and editor who was a friend and

biographer Biographers are authors who write an account of another person's life, while autobiographers are authors who write their own biography. Biographers Countries of working life: Ab=Arabia, AG=Ancient Greece, Al=Australia, Am=Armenian, AR=Ancient Rome ...

and had previously adapted Hemingway's '' The Snows of Kilimanjaro'', ''

The Killers The Killers are an American Rock music, rock band formed in Las Vegas, Nevada, in 2001 by Brandon Flowers (lead vocals, keyboards, bass) and Dave Keuning (lead guitar, backing vocals). After the band went through a number of short-term bas ...

'', and '' The Fifth Column'' for television, wrote the

for ''After the Storm'', basing it on a seven-page Hemingway short story of the same name published in the May 1932 issue of ''

Cosmopolitan Cosmopolitan may refer to: Internationalism * World citizen, one who eschews traditional geopolitical divisions derived from national citizenship * Cosmopolitanism, the idea that all of humanity belongs to a single moral community * Cosmopolitan ...

''. Hemingway based the short story on a purportedly true story a charter-boat

captain Captain is a title, an appellative for the commanding officer of a military unit; the supreme leader or highest rank officer of a navy ship, merchant ship, aeroplane, spacecraft, or other vessel; or the commander of a port, fire or police depa ...

Key West Key West is an island in the Straits of Florida, at the southern end of the U.S. state of Florida. Together with all or parts of the separate islands of Dredgers Key, Fleming Key, Sunset Key, and the northern part of Stock Island, it con ...

Florida Florida ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders the Gulf of Mexico to the west, Alabama to the northwest, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the north, the Atlantic ...

, told him in 1928 about a

conch Conch ( , , ) is a common name of a number of different medium-to-large-sized sea snails. Conch shells typically have a high Spire (mollusc), spire and a noticeable siphonal canal (in other words, the shell comes to a noticeable point on both ...

-fisherman's account of the sinking of the Spanish steamer with the loss of all 488 people on board on September 9, 1919, during the 1919 Florida Keys hurricane. The short story's anonymous narrator gives a first-person account of escaping a bar fight by slashing his assailant with a knife and fleeing in a

to hide out in the belief that he had killed the man. The narrator comes across the wreck of an

ocean liner An ocean liner is a type of passenger ship primarily used for transportation across seas or oceans. Ocean liners may also carry cargo or mail, and may sometimes be used for other purposes (such as for pleasure cruises or as hospital ships). The ...

in shallow water. He dives on the wreck and through a porthole sees a dead woman wearing jewelry, but he is unable to break the glass in the porthole to reach the jewelry. He returns to shore, discovers that the man he slashed did not die, and learns that the liner – reportedly carrying gold on board in a safe – had sunk when she sprang a leak during a storm and her

boiler A boiler is a closed vessel in which fluid (generally water) is heated. The fluid does not necessarily boil. The heated or vaporized fluid exits the boiler for use in various processes or heating applications, including water heating, centra ...

s exploded, killing her entire crew and all 450 passengers aboard. He waits for a week for stormy weather to subside before returning to the wreck, then discovers that people he refers to as "the Greeks" had blown the wreck open with

dynamite Dynamite is an explosive made of nitroglycerin, sorbents (such as powdered shells or clay), and Stabilizer (chemistry), stabilizers. It was invented by the Swedish people, Swedish chemist and engineer Alfred Nobel in Geesthacht, Northern German ...

and taken all the gold and valuables aboard. He laments having made no money off his discovery of the sunken liner.fiu.edu Ben Stoltzfus, Benjamin, "Hemingway's "After the Storm": A Lacanian Reading," fiu.edu Retrieved November 16, 2019.
/ref> Although the location of Hemingway's story – apparently the

Florida Keys The Florida Keys are a coral island, coral cay archipelago off the southern coast of Florida, forming the southernmost part of the continental United States. They begin at the southeastern coast of the Florida peninsula, about south of Miami a ...

– is ambiguous at best and it provides no dates for its events, Hotchner sets the film in the Bahamas in 1933. Like Hemingway's anonymous narrator, Hotchner's Arno character believes he stabbed a man to death in a bar fight, flees to avoid arrest, and discovers a sunken vessel containing the body of a woman (two women in the film version) wearing jewelry, although the unnamed ocean liner in Hemingway's story is replaced by the yacht ''Pride of Chicago'' in the film. Like the short story's narrator, the film's Arno character returns to shore, discovers that he did not kill his assailant in the bar fight, and returns to the wreck in the hope of salvaging valuables from it. Like the narrator, Arno ends up with nothing. Otherwise, the film adds a great deal of narrative that does not exist in the short story. Like the narrator's unnamed assailant, Ortega fights with Arno and is stabbed, but neither Ortega or any of the other characters in the film appear in the short story. The anonymous narrator has no equivalent to Arno's back story about his father and his father's watch or to his romance with Coquina, his relationship with Janine, or his associations with Jean-Pierre, Ortega, or Sergeant Major Jim, and the narrator deals with none of the schemes and double-crosses the film's characters do. Unlike Arno, the narrator encounters no shark while diving. While in the short story the narrator finds that someone else has dynamited the ocean liner's wreck and made off with the valuables, in the film Arno dynamites the sunken yacht himself and only loses the gold and jewelry he salvaged when Coquina steals it from him.

Production

Location

''After the Storm'' was filmed on

Belize Belize is a country on the north-eastern coast of Central America. It is bordered by Mexico to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and Guatemala to the west and south. It also shares a maritime boundary with Honduras to the southeast. P ...

′s Ambergris Caye in the

Caribbean Sea The Caribbean Sea is a sea of the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean in the tropics of the Western Hemisphere, located south of the Gulf of Mexico and southwest of the Sargasso Sea. It is bounded by the Greater Antilles to the north from Cuba ...

. Production began in March 2000.

Film format

''After the Storm'' was filmed in Super 35 with a 2.35:1

aspect ratio The aspect ratio of a geometry, geometric shape is the ratio of its sizes in different dimensions. For example, the aspect ratio of a rectangle is the ratio of its longer side to its shorter side—the ratio of width to height, when the rectangl ...

.After the Storm (2001 TV Movie) Technical Specifications — IMDb
/ref> It was printed in

anamorphic format Anamorphic format is a cinematography technique that captures widescreen images using recording media with narrower native Aspect ratio (image), aspect ratios. Originally developed for 35 mm movie film, 35 mm film to create widescreen pres ...

Broadcast

Originally intended for a theatrical release, ''After the Storm'' failed to secure one.Rotten Tomatoes — After the Storm Retrieved November 16, 2019
/ref> Instead, it was licensed to the

, on which it premiered as a television movie on March 20, 2001.

Awards

''After the Storm'' was named Best Feature Film at the 2000 New York International Independent Film and Video Festival and its director, Guy Ferland, was individually commended on the realism he brought to the film with underwater photography.

Home media

With footage added to it that gave it an "R" rating, ''After the Storm'' was released as a Region 1 widescreen DVD on May 29, 2001.

References

{{Guy Ferland, state=autocollapse 2000s adventure drama films 2001 television films 2001 films American adventure drama films Films based on works by Ernest Hemingway Films directed by Guy Ferland Trimark Pictures films USA Network original films Films set in the Bahamas Sea adventure films Films set in 1933 2001 drama films American drama television films 2000s English-language films 2000s American films English-language adventure drama films