‘How To Blow Up a Pipeline’ review: An explosive eco-thriller

A group of strangers hatch a plan to blow up a pipeline in West Texas as an act of climate protest in Neon's thrilling How To Blow Up a Pipeline

How to Blow Up a Pipeline, which was contructed using ideas from Andreas Malm's book of the same name, is structured like a classic heist movie. Act one: we're introduced to each member of our ragtag group of protagonists trying to pull off an impossible feat. Act two: we watch as they lay the groundwork for the plan — taking care to emphasize how much can — and probably will — go wrong. Act three: we watch the heist play out with brute skillfulness, of course with more than one unplanned bump along the way. But this is no heist movie. 

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Throughout the movie, we learn through pointed but impactful flashbacks how each member of our motley crew has come to find themselves in West Texas attempting to blow up an oil pipeline. More importantly, though, we learn why. The central idea of Malm's book is that traditional protesting tactics regarding the climate crisis are little too late and drastic measures — like blowing up an oil pipeline to spike the price of fuel — are necessary to get the attention of those that can enact actual change. 

The swift efficiency of Ariela Barer, Jordan Sjol, and Daniel Goldhaber's screenplay (Goldhaber also directs) allows us to get to know how each character fits into the cog of their plan while we watch how it unfolds. At the helm are Xochitl (Barer) and Shawn (Marcus Scribner), two climate activist college students who are tired of the endless and fruitless protests that seemingly shout into a void. Together they recruit aloof Native American amateur bomb-builder Michael (Forrest Goodluck), local landowner veteran Dwayne (Jake Weary), vandal anarchist couple Logan (Lukas Gage) and Rowan (Kristine Froseth), Xochitl's childhood friend Theo (Sasha Lane) and her girlfriend Alicia (Jayme Lawson).

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While each character's motivation is outlined clearly — and perhaps a bit too tidily — How to Blow Up a Pipeline flows through its runtime like… well, oil in a pipeline. Despite the dusty West Texas landscape, the movie moves like any sleek heist movie — picture a western Ocean's Eleven. Still, Goldhaber allows for moments of overwhelming tension like Michael's careful preparation of the bombs — that have the equivalent power of ten sticks of dynamite — where one wrong move could cause an explosion. While the forward propulsion of the gang's mission provides plenty of moments of suspense, there are more surprises in store as we explore more how this group is woven together. 

How to Blow Up a Pipeline's greatest feature, however, is that it doesn't sanctify its protagonists. It never presupposes that they're heroes or that what they're doing is right — even if their cause is just. They argue about what the public will call them. How will history remember them? After throwing a few names around, they settle on terrorists. Whether or not they believe themselves to be classified as such depends on which character you ask. Some of them seem more understanding of the gravity of their crime than others. By the time it's revealed whether or not they were successful, we've found ourselves rooting for their success, even if it's just because we've gotten to know their motivations. But then the movie itself questions them, or in some cases misleads us. The unraveling mystery is what make How to Blow Up a Pipeline more than just  a call to action, but a call to explore your own position. 

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Hey! I'm Karl. You can find me on Twitter here. I'm also a Tomatometer-approved critic.

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