Dark Waters (2019)

I was switching TV channels last days, and on some I've run into "World War Z", on another into "I Am Legend", so if you don't get enough apocalypse from the news, you have a fair share of choices... I still say it's better to not look for an appropriate episode from TWD. On the other hand I've never been too much into comedies, which would probably be a more appropriate subject for cutting some tension off during these times, so sorry about that. And I also didn't have much time and options to choose from this week - so I've ended up with something very close to a documentary = "Dark Waters".

As an intro, I have to confess that despite catching lots of non-essential info to make me prepared for pretty much any trivia quiz, I didn't hear about the Teflon case. Or to not make everybody throw their cooking pans out the window, it's more precisely about a chemical named PFOA used in Teflon fabrication up to 2013 and which apparently was present in the final product only in very small quantity. At least that's what a very quick online search reveals, because the movie doesn't provide a clear conclusion on that. But still, what's this PFOA and what's in the movie?...

"Dark Waters" is a biopic, following the activity of a lawyer, Rob Billott, from 1998 until 2015. The guy was the employee of a law firm specialized in defending corporations, and one day got a visit from an angry farmer who had a problem with his cows. Precisely, no place left to bury them. The cause: the contaminated water in a nearby river. And like that, Rob Billott, step by step, ends up discovering something called PFOA - as mentioned above, a compound used in fabricating Teflon by DuPont - one of the largest companies in the chemical industry worldwide. Which company found a place to dump their toxic waste exactly near the farmer's land. The situation aggravates when it's discovered that also the drinking water in the area is contaminated, and further gets worse when it's found that company employees involved in the production process have cancer. And like that we're getting to a real legal war between Billott vs DuPont. Who wins? Let's not spoil it :)

Even though I'm neither much into documentaries, I have to admit that the main positive part of "Dark Waters" is its documentary trait. Obviously, you shouldn't expect something like a legal thriller by John Grisham. And probably that's the reason for the less positive part. Not that it isn't like a John Grisham based movie, but that it tries to much to be. I found some parts to be overly dramatized. In any case, the story deserves watching for your general knowledge + I added Teflon & PFOA info to my data bank :)

Rating: 3.5 out of 5