Time for a good old space movie. Which means plenty of cosmic big screen vistas, fiery launch sequences and people losing their tiny minds. This is simultaneously a film packed with ideas and events, while still still being strangely desolate and cold feeling. Which is about right for the genre. It's also a story full of ideas cribbed from other sources whether it's 2001 or Apocalypse Now. Does it manage to reach the lofty heights of these inspirations? Well, no. But it does manage to be occasionally thought provoking and hypnotic even if the plot is sometimes about as bumpy as the lunar surface. There are certainly some memorable moments along the way and it's an entertaining ride, but just how much of this all holds together as a singular voyage of discovery is debatable.
There's a lot to digest as astronaut Roy (Brad Pitt) is re-assigned from his day job at a gargantuan space communications array when the installation is damaged by a series of energy pulses. It turns out that this energy is being thrown out from a ship somewhere in orbit around Neptune, a mission once thought to be lost. Its aim was to search for new life away from the influence of the Sun's radiation, and just happens to have been headed by Roy's father Clifford (Tommy Lee Jones). This incident raises questions about what exactly is going on out there, and why nobody tried to retrieve him in the past sixteen years is unclear. But beyond the intended level of intrigue this is a script that doesn't always follow any sort of obvious internal logic.
The first half of the story does however include a lot of compelling elements and some particularly interesting world building. This is a near future version of Earth where the military runs the space programme and travel to the Moon is like taking a trip to a budget airport. Out in space mankind's colonies are full of tacky souvenir stands and they're covered in graffiti. Certain parts of the Moon are are a Wild-West plagued by pirates, and an underground base on Mars is a desolate concrete maze where stray dogs roam the tunnels. Some of these inclusions might start to feel a little silly when rocket personnel offer in-flight pillows for over a hundred dollars, but it's an interesting mixture of heightened reality and bleak dystopia.
The set pieces during the first hour or so are also pretty spectacular whether it's the opening salvo above the Earth's atmosphere or the initially peaceful rover trip from one Moon-base to the next. At times however it does start to feel as if these little action and suspense moments are inserted into the journey strategically to lend it a sense of grandeur and to balance out the more introspective moments. I was surprised to find this wasn't based on a novel, and these moments weren't lifted from separate chapters of an existing story. Particularly all the dour narration. But each moment taken own its own merits is pretty good even if, again, some scenes start to become a little silly; notably when Roy and his crew-mates stop to investigate an S.O.S. call. Still, in general the entertainment value is always pretty substantial.
Things start to feel a little less congruous once he reaches Mars, a far less populated outpost where the last undamaged military communications array sits safely underground. Here the break neck pace of the earlier scenes gives way to a more contemplative mood, which also allows the actions of those involved feel less rational. The central mission is for Roy to contact his father, here in what seems to be an old sound studio. Why they couldn't just have recorded a message on Earth is never clear, and it's not specified whether Clifford can actually see Roy, or if he's even receiving the message at all. As things go on there things both become more complicated and simultaneously much easier for Roy who learns new truths from convenient exposition dump characters and then continues on his journey relatively smoothly with their help.
A lot of these more mechanical moments involving the reasoning and motives of characters might feel less central to some viewers, in a story which is pretty heavy with the metaphors. But with so many heady ideas about emotional disconnects, absent fathers, and humans obsessed with alien contact instead of remembering their own humanity... it makes you wonder if all those action pit stops where really relevant at all. Or if all the spoken monologues are studio mandated. A times it starts to feel as though the main character's journey was plotted out and the rest of the film exists to push them from one spectacle to the next. It's a story in which astronauts take pills to curb their emotions and constant psychological exams are necessary, which is fascinating stuff. But whether those moments are flush with the crowd pleasing inclusions often feels questionable.
It's often a beautiful looking movie thanks to Interstellar cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema, and the sombre tone and general ambience results in a compelling experience. But some of the third act reveals aren't quite as dramatic as they should be and it starts to lean into Gravity style leaps in logic to reach a strangely rushed conclusion. On top of this characters who monitor their heartbeat constantly and never allow themselves to get excited or have relationships... just aren't that engaging to watch. It jumps between dark and eerie, sometimes dystopian and hopeless, but then reaches for an emotional resolution that doesn't quite feel earned. It's certainly an ambitious story with plenty of enjoyable ingredients, especially those made for the big screen. But it never quite makes the giant leap towards essential space cinema.
3/5
