Craig Gillespie experienced his breakout “hit” in 2007 at the Toronto International Film Festival with Lars and the Real Girl. You know the one. That strange indie splash that made leagues of women (and men) jealous of an inanimate sex doll, quasi-adorably (and entirely eerily) doted on by a mustached Ryan Gosling. From there, Gillespie directed an underrated and ably cast remake of Fright Night. As a suave vampire, Collin Ferrell gave his crowning scenery (and neck) chewing performance. Some would call this Gillespie’s transition to the mainstream and they wouldn’t be entirely wrong, though the Disney-produced baseball drama The Million Dollar Arm really saw the last twinkle of a celebrated indie director taken by the vast empire of film as multi-media conglomerate.

The Finest Hours finds Gillespie back in the helicopter armistice of the House of Mouse to tell the true story of a 1952 Coast Guard rescue mission. Chris Pine plays Bernie Webber, an apprehensive but bold seaman who’s ordered to rescue the crew of a tanker, split in two and laid up off the coast of Cape Cod. Facing a brutal blizzard and punishing seas, Webber and his crew must brave a feared sand bar, the lack of a compass and a pint-sized vessel that’s more and more tattered by the minute. The picture opens a year before the rescue with the inklings of Webber’s courtship with Miriam (Holliday Grainger) and quickly gets to the point of establishing our characters.

Pine plays largely against type as a quiet, contemplative type though when he’s thrust into action, he’s sharp and competent. He’s cocky, yes, but in a very different manner than the tactile bravado of his Captain Kirk. Webber is both meek and confident and Pine ably explores the crossroads between the two seemingly combative traits. The role allows the still up-and-coming performer to further spread his wings and showcase more of his impressive range. At this point, the more we see from Pine, the better. We’re just waiting for that golden role to come along and sweep him into Oscar’s arms.

All bravery aside, The Finest Hours isn’t shy when showing off the impressive wrath of the New England ocean. Poseidon himself couldn’t have whipped up a more torrential storm as Ray Sybert (Casey Affleck) and his now stranded crew quickly come to realize. Unsure if a rescue mission is on the way, Sybert, an engine-man never popular with the ship’s populace, whips the crew into making every effort to save themselves and this involves some instances of seafaring ingenuity. As Sybert, Affleck’s performance is characteristically understated, even if the character remains one-note. The same could be said of Ben Foster – he of the wholly unappreciated character actor variety – who disappears into a convincing Boston accent but is never afforded the arc that would make the performance pop or the glory to make him memorable beyond his limited screen time.

Gillespie is mostly able to carve more than monosyllabic tropes from the rest of his supporting cast, which is admirable enough considering the limited time we spend with them. I’ve never been a big fan of antagonist Eric Bana and he proves the least compelling of the main trio as a green commander hailing from the landlocked Chincoteague, VA who seems to always be stuck on the wrong side of a bad call. But with so much going on and go many people to check in with, there’s few notable moments shared between the rest of the supporting cast which limits our investment in their plight. This is in large part due to the overwhelming safeness of the proposed disaster film.

Gillespie’s rebellion against the sanitized disaster film modus operandi is hardly a putsch. Even the chaos itself is constrained to take place mostly off-screen. To find itself limited to a Hitchcockian shadow stabbing. The deaths – or is it death? (we’re told of countless but only witness one) – are bloodless and find the cameras quickly yanked from. Not that a film of this nature must revel in its body count but it isn’t a bad way to build up stakes, which The Finest Hours is wont to lack on occasion.

There are one or two breathless moments, most notably when Webber and company navigate the imposing brunt of a bar. Barrel after barrel of salt water plow down on Webber’s shoddy skiff, sending it careening into inaction or rolling helplessly under the full force of a 30-foot rogue wave. The sequence is easily The Finest Hour’s finest hour.

The movie does splits apart like the Pendleton tanker in the last 10 minutes, once the dénouement of victory has rung its nautical bell. There’s a natural finale beat that’s passed over for the ripe dairy factory on the horizon and Gillespie, most certainly handheld by the seersuckers at Disney, is forced to milk with all his might. As the final minutes stretch onward, we’re privy to that milk churning into a genuine cheese that floods the cinema tsunami-style.

That’s not to say that the emotionality in The Finest Hours is wholly manufactured. Rather, there are moments where the assembly line drama shows its fray and you can see the machinations of Disney’s drama machine pumping into action like the pistons of a mighty – though fatally flawed – tanker.

CONCLUSION: Disney’s ‘The Finest Hours’ is a dialed-down disaster adventure that boasts moments of technical might and is punctuated by surprisingly earnest performances from its committed cast. But there’s an almost pathological need to scrub all the grit from this Coast Guard glory story, resulting in a cut and dry Disney venture that’s nowhere near necessary viewing (and will likely be forgotten by those who’ve seen it soon after watching).