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How to Blow Up a Pipeline Movie Review

How to Blow Up a Pipeline is a 2023 thriller film directed by Daniel Goldhaber and starring Lukas Gage and Ariela Barer. It’s a very problematic propaganda movie.

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“If the American empire is calling us terrorists,

then we’re doing something right“

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With the climate crisis at a dangerous point of no return, a group of brave environmental activists come up with a daring plan to make their voices heard and disrupt an oil pipeline. The vast majority of critics have expressed their utmost respect for this movie that in a nutshell signals the main issue that movie critics today exhibit – their evident political bent plays a huge role in their work.

What this movie proposes is morally objectionable to say the least. As the title would suggest, blowing up a pipeline is the main focus of this group of activists, which could have been mined for some great discussions about the morality/immorality behind this action, but sadly we only got that sporadically. What was even more problematic was that ending.

Basically, the filmmakers in that final stretch chose what they believe in, which is supporting this cause no matter what, and just like that this movie became a propaganda piece. It would have been so much more effective to just present your case and open it for discussion among viewers, but the fact that they chose to plant that one-note, biased message at the end of the story just further supports my claim that this is not just propaganda, but one where clearly even the people involved knew that it’s not for a plainly good cause. There is a big difference between radical protesting and terrorism and this film seems to ignore that.

Another huge problem with the movie is its lack of strong characterization. Admittedly, its cast of capable young actors did a great job in at least somewhat acquainting us with these people and each of them should hopefully receive a bigger career in Hollywood going forward, but the characters themselves were underwritten and not at all likable. The flashbacks were also overwhelming.

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How to Blow Up a Pipeline does have a couple of thrilling sequences that were so well executed given the indie budgetary constraints, but at the end of the day these moments were fleeting and the majority of the movie wasn’t as intense as I’d hoped for going in. The film looks and sounds fine, but it’s hardly cinematic and/or sophisticated at tackling these timely issues. This director previously made a much better and more sophisticated ‘Cam’ and it’s a shame that he couldn’t duplicate that success here too.