How the 'Storm' plays in Yankee harbor town

THE image is indelible: a tiny fishing boat clinging to a vertical-cresting wave the size of the Grand Canyon.

But for the residents of this fishing community north of Boston, "The Perfect Storm" is more than a movie. It is part of their history.

More than 10,000 Gloucester fishermen have died since its founding in 1623, and these all-too-common tragedies bond a hardy people together. This is, perhaps, the reason the bulk of residents have embraced the film. They see it as a celebration of the bravery of the industry and a chance for recognition.

But others say they don't need a movie to remember the storm that claimed six members of their community nine years ago. On a Gloucester fishing dock, Paul Collins paces agitatedly among pieces of ice. His best friend was Billy Tyne, captain of the Andrea Gail, the boat that perished in the worst storm of the 20th century, and Mr. Collins says he has no plans to watch George Clooney portray his friend on the big screen. Watching the movie would be too painful for him, Collins says, and he is unhappy with the artistic license the filmmakers took, creating a romantic subplot and a rivalry between two of the fishermen.

As the movie opens today, Gloucester is awash in mixed emotions. While many locals welcome the Hollywood pizazz and the minted coins that the blockbuster brings, others worry about its impact on their community.

And, as with any film bearing the tag "based on a true story," the film has raised questions about the ethics of making a profit by depicting a tragedy.

"This question is going to come up more and more as the appetite for mainstream entertainment for these ... kinds of stories is spiraling faster and faster," says Robert Thompson, director of the center for the study of popular television at Syracuse University in New York. "Waiting for nine years actually seems quite a calm, restrained act compared to the Amy Fisher story. I am bothered by people who say, 'There ought to be rule that you have to wait 25 years until you can make a movie about a tragedy.' If there was a rule, it ought to be that you don't do it in bad taste, ever."

That's something Gloucester officials believe the makers of "The Perfect Storm" strove to avoid. "[Director] Wolfgang Peterson came into my office and said, 'I want you to understand that this is going to be respectful, it's going to be sensitive, it's not going to be about exploitation of the way of life, of the people, or of the heritage," says Gloucester Mayor Bruce Tobey.

"My gut feeling is that [the filmmakers] are rather moved by Gloucester, its history, its traditions," says Joseph Garland, a local historian and friend of Sebastian Junger, author of the 1997 bestseller that inspired the movie. "My sense is that they have done their best to try to be true to that."

Deep oceanic roots

Few towns covet their reputation as jealously as this, the oldest fishing port in the United States, which lies at the end of a peninsula that noses out from the New England coastline just north of Boston.

And the case of Gloucester indicates that Hollywood may be trying to shed its reputation for sweeping in and out of towns with the arrogance of Rome's imperial conquerors.

Some of the movie's stars make it clear they don't regard this film as just another gig.

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