--- title: "Waterworld" year: 1995 kind: "film" canonical: "https://film.one/film/waterworld" fi1m_score: 61 critics_score: 56 critics_reviews: 17 published: "2026-09-19T08:35:06.383277+00:00" updated: "2026-09-19T08:48:13.696952+00:00" region: "US" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Waterworld (1995) Directed by Kevin Reynolds · 2h 15m · MPA PG-13 · Adventure, Action, Science Fiction **Fi1m score: 61** · Critics 56 from 17 reviews *In a sentence:* Costner drinks his own filtered urine in the first five minutes and it is the closest he comes to smiling > Kevin Reynolds and Kevin Costner built a floating world for real, and when the jet skis hit the atoll it is worth every rivet. Between the set pieces the film drifts, and its hero is a man nobody, including the film, seems to like. ## Synopsis The polar ice has melted and the world is one ocean. The Mariner (Kevin Costner), a lone sailor on a patched trimaran, lives by trading what he finds: a jar of dirt buys him entry to a floating atoll of scavenged steel and rope. When the atoll’s people discover the gills behind his ears and the webbing between his toes, they cage him as a mutant. Then the Smokers arrive, a fleet of jet skis and a rusting oil tanker under the Deacon (Dennis Hopper), looking for Enola (Tina Majorino), an orphan girl with a map tattooed on her back that may show the way to Dryland. Helen (Jeanne Tripplehorn), who has been looking after her, frees the Mariner on one condition: he takes them both with him. ## Review Kevin Reynolds’s *Waterworld* is [*Mad Max*](https://film.one/film/mad-max) with the desert replaced by an ocean and the cars by jet skis, and for long stretches it knows exactly what that means. The ice caps have gone, dirt is currency, and a loner with a fast boat is the only man who can cross the water. Peter Rader and David Twohy’s script gives the loner gills and webbed feet, so that he is not just apart from the survivors but a different species, and then asks him to look after a woman and a child. It is a decent adventure with a sulking hero, and it deserves neither the mockery it collected nor the rescue some critics have since attempted. What it does deserve is credit for being real. Dennis Gassner’s atoll is a ring of rusted hulls, scaffolding and rope lashed together on open water, and Dean Semler shoots it in hard, flat Pacific sunlight with the horizon in nearly every frame, so that we never forget there is nothing else out there. John Bloomfield dresses the survivors in netting, sailcloth and salvaged rubber, and gives the Smokers goggles and grease. When the Smokers come over the wall of the atoll on jet skis, with a rusting oil tanker lumbering behind them, we sat forward and stayed there. Real machines hit real water and real things burn, and the sequence has a weight that later computer work has rarely matched. Dennis Hopper is having a marvellous time as the Deacon, preaching to his Smokers from the tanker’s deck and taking each setback as a personal insult. He is funny, which the film badly needs, and he is the only person on screen who seems to enjoy living in this world. Gerard Murphy’s Nord and R. D. Call’s Enforcer give him people to shout at. Michael Jeter’s Old Gregor, the atoll’s inventor, is the film’s one sketch of a civilisation worth saving. The trouble is the man in the middle. Kevin Costner plays the Mariner as a closed-off customer who would rather be alone, which is the part as written; the film then needs us to warm to him as Helen (Jeanne Tripplehorn) and Enola (Tina Majorino) do, and Costner, who also produced, never lets us in. He is watchful and physically committed, hauling rope and diving off the mast, but he does not appear to like anyone, including himself, and after an hour we found we had stopped minding whether he reached Dryland. Tripplehorn does the work of making him tolerable. Majorino is better still, a chattering, stubborn child who treats the end of the world as mildly inconvenient, and she is the reason the film has any warmth at all. Once the trimaran leaves the atoll, the film drifts with it. Peter Boyle cuts the action hard and cleanly, but the stretches between are slack, scenes of three people not getting on in a small boat, and there are more of them than the story can bear. James Newton Howard’s score is loud brass for the battles and a soft, wandering theme for the sea, and the soft theme is the better. It carries the film’s one properly beautiful passage, a dive below the surface that Semler lights in dim green from above, and that moved us more than we expected, because for two minutes the film stops shouting and shows us what has been lost. Against the film it borrows from, it comes off worse. [*Mad Max 2*](https://film.one/film/mad-max-2) (1981) had a hero as taciturn as this one and made him bearable by putting a dog and a talkative pilot next to him; Reynolds has Hopper, but keeps him on the other boat. The reviews so far are split down the middle, with some calling it a folly and others an unjustly maligned B-picture, and for once we find the average about right. It is neither. See it on the largest screen you have, for the atoll, for the tanker and for Hopper. It runs 135 minutes and carries a 12 certificate, and it opened in British cinemas on 11 August 1995, when it was widely expected to fail. Most of it does not. *Fi1m score 61, published 19 September 2026.* ## What the critics say Most critics agree on the one thing Waterworld does well: the spectacle is real. The stunts, the sets and the waterborne action sequences draw praise across almost every review, and several single out Dennis Hopper’s villain as the film’s liveliest presence. The drowned-world design is the department where even the harshest notices concede something. The spread is wide, with the reviews split nearly evenly between positive, mixed and negative. Reservations cluster on the script, a second half that loses momentum, and Kevin Costner’s taciturn lead, which Collider finds sullen enough to drain the fun from the adventure. The clearest pattern is one of time: the notices from its 1995 release are cooler, while later reassessments in The Guardian, Empire and The Ringer argue it never deserved its reputation as a turkey. The AV Club stands apart, calling it grim, joyless and ugly. ### Reviews we read (17) - **Empire**, Jeff Dawson (75/100, inferred): The critic finds the film a surprisingly impressive sci-fi adventure and a cut above average over-hyped sequels, praising the capsule world created by Reynolds along with its spectacular stunts and sets. [Read](https://www.empireonline.com/movies/reviews/waterworld-review/) - **The Guardian** (75/100, inferred): The critic argues that Waterworld does not deserve its reputation as one of the worst Hollywood turkeys and is instead a solid B-movie. They single out the ambitious action set-pieces and Dennis Hopper's villainous performance for praise. [Read](https://www.theguardian.com/film/2020/jul/30/waterworld-kevin-costner-cult-classic) - **Time Out**, TCh (65/100, inferred): The film succeeds as an eyecatching blockbuster that creates a convincing waterlogged world with inventive design and action sequences. It loses momentum in the second half with formulaic plotting and a softening of its taciturn hero. [Read](https://www.timeout.com/movies/waterworld) - **Variety**, Todd McCarthy (65/100, inferred): It is a not-bad futuristic actioner owing a debt to Mad Max, with astounding sequences, an unusual hero, nifty villain, and spectacular physicality from muscular direction and stunts, but lacks sufficient humor and true exhilaration. [Read](https://variety.com/1995/film/reviews/waterworld-2-1200442100/) - **RogerEbert.com**, Roger Ebert (2.5/4): The film is a decent futuristic action picture with some great sets, intriguing ideas, and memorable images, but it could have been better and fails to make the viewer care about the characters. [Read](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/waterworld-1995) - **Little White Lies**, Anton Bitel (60/100, inferred): The critic views the restored film as a spectacular but flawed seaborne adventure that excels in ambitious world-building around environmental themes and post-apocalyptic survival. It falters in characterisation, with a dull lead performance and overlong extended cuts that dilute the theatrical version's impact. [Read](https://lwlies.com/home-ents/waterworld-review-kevin-costner) - **Los Angeles Times**, Kenneth Turan (60/100, inferred): It is a moderately successful guy’s movie with weak and strong elements, brilliant explosions, and haunting underwater moments, but flat dialogue, jokeyness, and a plot that does not hold together. [Read](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1995-07-28-ca-28832-story.html) - **The New York Times**, Janet Maslin (50/100, inferred): The big, brawny epic has daring action scenes that remain exciting despite sloppy assembly and slack stretches between explosions; its storytelling is crude and lacks coherent fantasy. [Read](https://www.nytimes.com/1995/07/28/movies/film-review-waterworld-aquatic-armageddon-with-plenty-of-toys.html) - **The Independent** (40/100, inferred): The critic calls the film an inevitable vast aquatic turkey given its enormous cost and premise but argues that Costner has unwittingly forged a truly modern myth that is symbolic and visionary. [Read](https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/wet-wet-wet-1594935.html) - **The Hollywood Reporter**, David Hunter (30/100, inferred): The film is an uneven, uninvolving post-apocalypse epic hampered by script troubles and creative compromises. Chaotic battle sequences and aquatic feats provide occasional thrills amid the flaws. [Read](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/waterworld-review-movie-1995-1221421/) - **The New Yorker**, Terrence Rafferty (30/100, inferred): The over-budget production is no good and amounts to three ordinary pictures in one, undone by smug environmental parable elements, weak humor, and Costner’s self-aggrandizing star vehicle vanity. [Read](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1995/08/07/lost-at-sea) - **The AV Club**, Nathan Rabin (20/100, inferred): Waterworld is portrayed as an epic folly and grim, joyless adventure that damaged Kevin Costner's career. It stands out for its pessimism, ugliness, and extravagant but hideous production design compared to similar films. [Read](https://www.avclub.com/my-year-of-flops-case-file-42-waterworld-1798211631) - **Eye for Film**, Gator MacReady (80/100, inferred): The critic finds Waterworld a strong, enjoyable action/sci-fi adventure that delivers escapism, impressive stunts and effects, an excellent score, and strong production values despite its troubled history and unfair reputation. [Read](https://www.eyeforfilm.co.uk/review/waterworld-film-review-by-gator-macready) - **/Film**, Chris Evangelista (75/100, inferred): The critic argues the film is ambitious and entertaining with impressive real-world production design and scale, despite flaws like a wooden lead performance and occasional narrative drift; the Ulysses Cut expands it enjoyably for fans. [Read](https://www.slashfilm.com/564197/waterworld-blu-ray/) - **The Ringer**, Miles Surrey (75/100, inferred): The critic argues that Waterworld deserved better than its reputation as a punchline, praising its unapologetic weirdness, practical spectacle, and environmental themes as impressive ambition. While not calling it a masterpiece, the piece highlights its unique scale and crowd-pleasing elements amid production chaos. [Read](https://www.theringer.com/2025/07/28/movies/waterworld-movie-30th-anniversary-kevin-costner) - **Den of Geek**, Simon Brew (3/5): The critic finds Waterworld a flawed but enjoyable action adventure that holds up reasonably well despite its troubled production. They single out the real waves, spectacular practical sequences, and stunts for praise while noting the film is long and meandering. [Read](https://www.denofgeek.com/movies/waterworld-blu-ray-review/) - **Collider**, Andre Dellamorte (40/100, inferred): The critic views the film as a dull slog dragged down by Kevin Costner's sullen lead performance, which drains the fun from what should be a swashbuckling adventure. The production's ambitious water-based action and sets earn some acknowledgment despite the flaws. [Read](https://collider.com/waterworld-blu-ray-review/) ## Details - **Director:** Kevin Reynolds - **Director:** Kevin Reynolds - **Writer:** Peter Rader, David Twohy - **Cinematography:** Dean Semler - **Editor:** Peter Boyle - **Music:** James Newton Howard - **Production design:** Dennis Gassner - **Costume design:** John Bloomfield - **Producer:** Kevin Costner, John Davis, Charles Gordon - **Cast:** Kevin Costner as Mariner; Dennis Hopper as Deacon; Jeanne Tripplehorn as Helen; Tina Majorino as Enola; R. D. Call as Enforcer; Gerard Murphy as Nord; Michael Jeter as Old Gregor; Rick Aviles as Gatesman - **Runtime:** 2h 15m - **Certificate (MPA):** PG-13 - **Release (the US):** 28 July 1995 - **Genres:** Adventure, Action, Science Fiction - **Budget:** $175 million - **Box office:** $264 million - **Trailer:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4LLyBCz9tw ## Where to watch in the US - Starz: streaming - Tubi: free - Hulu: add-on, hd, leaving 2026-10-01 - The Roku Channel: add-on, hd, leaving 2026-10-01 - Amazon Prime Video: add-on, uhd - Amazon Prime Video: rent $3.99, uhd - Amazon Prime Video: buy $4.99, uhd *Checked 2026-09-19.* Also available in: AT, AU, BE, BG, CA, CH, CL, CO, CZ, DE, DK, ES, FI, FR, GB, HU, IE, IT, JP, LT, MX, NL, NO, NZ, PL, PT, RO, RS, SE, TR, US. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country. ## Awards - Academy Awards 1996: Best Sound (nominated) ## If you liked this - *Mad Max 2* (1981), Fi1m 88: The template, done leaner and faster, with a hero who is allowed a dog. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/mad-max-2.md) - *Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind* (1984), Fi1m 85: A ruined world, a toxic sea and a lead who actually likes people. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/warriors-of-the-wind.md) - *The Abyss* (1989): Cameron puts his cast in real water and the strain shows in every face. - *Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World* (2003), Fi1m 86: Life aboard a small vessel with nowhere to hide, shot with patience. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/master-and-commander-the-far-side-of-the-world.md) - *Snowpiercer* (2013), Fi1m 80: After the flood, the freeze: another post-apocalypse built one set at a time. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/snowpiercer.md) --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/film/waterworld