Submarine drama 'Phantom': Down periscope

Claudia Puig, USA TODAY | USATODAY

As one might expect from a submarine drama, Phantom is claustrophobic and confining. If only it were compelling.

This leaden thriller (** out of four; rated R; opens Friday nationwide), set during the Cold War, takes place almost entirely aboard a Soviet submarine. Supposedly inspired by true events, the story centers on a Soviet naval commander, Demi (Ed Harris), who is haunted by his past. He is ordered to direct a covert mission that could ignite a nuclear war.

The dialogue and action on the boat are fictional. The true events, though, are undeniably intriguing: A rogue Russian ballistic-missile submarine that sank in 1968 was later found on the ocean floor. This little-known event could have triggered a nuclear war.

The idea of imagining what happened aboard this doomed vessel sounds riveting, but as envisioned here it feels talky, tedious and vague. The action sequences are riddled with movie clichés.

The story, written and directed by Todd Robinson, is told from the perspective of a Russian crew. A cast of mostly American actors plays Russians, without any vestige of accents. This might be the film's most intriguing choice. But the flat rendering of the Russian point of view sheds no light on foreign sensibilities.

Harris and William Fichtner, as Alex, his second in command, put in solid performances, but their characters are thinly drawn. Harris' Demi is either in gruff mode or psychologically tortured. The rest of the cast, whose objectives and personal stances are murky, could be cardboard cutouts.

The dialogue is often trite, punctuated by military jargon. When those on board stage an insurrection, Demi denounces them with: "This is the work of madmen."

And yet, by his own admission, he might be equally mentally unstable: "There are times I feel I'm losing my mind." Cue the ominous swelling music.

Alex later tells him: "If I'm going to die, I'm going to do it here." Well, seeing as how he's trapped in a submarine with a missile and a crew that has mutinied, that's hardly news.

We learn that Demi once crashed this very ship, and mystery shrouds that incident but haunts him in feverish flashbacks. He suffered a brain injury in that crash. And if it's not bad enough that a crew of sailors is being led by a man with possibly clouded judgment, the ship's technicians know more than he does about the real nature of this mission.

The technicians are led by Bruni (David Duchovny), a KGB spy who installs a cloaking device on the sub and plans to detonate a nuclear device. The nuke, according to his top-secret orders, would be fired on an American fleet, and blame would be deflected onto the Chinese.

In order to set off World War III, Bruni must wrest control from Demi. But as depicted, the Soviet sub exists in a vacuum. No shots of the American vessel are offered, nor are any real sense of oceanic or geographic context, beyond generic establishing shots of a vast ocean. A heightened drumbeat and dramatic music don't mask a lack of real tension in the storytelling.

When the inevitable happens, it's followed by a sentimental, quasi-spiritual conclusion that offers a corny sense of redemption.

The combination of tight close-ups and jarring camera work might require a dose of Dramamine. Better yet, give this movie a wide berth and check out a superb film set in a submarine, the 1981 classic Das Boot.