It seems rather fitting that in the week when the European Space Agency completed it’s staggering, ridiculous, visionary, 20 year project
to land a probe on a comet flying at 135,000 km/h that Christopher Nolan would release his own
staggering, ridiculous, visionary film. Interstellar
is a film about human endeavor, but it's a film about cinematic endeavor too, and
in a year when big money movie-making became increasingly ironic, and tediously self
aware, the emotional plunge pool of seeing a
work of this stature, with its heart located so prominently on-sleeve, is about as close as you can hope to get to a cathartic cinematic experience in such cynical times as these.
It simply says; Yes, we can do better.
It simply says; Yes, we can do better.
Deep breath and... Defiant, plucky, Matthew McConaughey plays the defiant, plucky, Cooper; a salt of the earth, blue
collar, farming, engineering, ex-test pilot (and so on) in the not so distant future. We
learn that food is running out; that the world's armies have been disbanded; and that over
population peaked and was cruelly dealt with. Cascading dust clouds suggest that the
worst is yet to come.
A gravitational anomaly sends our blue jeans/white-T/ Carhartt wearing hero to a hidden NASA base where efforts are being made to
find humanity a new home. We learn that the team has discovered a loophole at
the arse-end of Saturn and that an expedition, named Lazarus, was sent through to
find inhabitable worlds. We find the team back on earth collectively blowing on one last roll
of the dice; a plan to form a new colony while they attempt to solve an equation which
holds the key to getting the rest of us up there too. They soon ask Cooper to take the wheel.
Supernovas of shit collide with orbiting fans.
Supernovas of shit collide with orbiting fans.
Much like the worn out, battered, retro futurist, mid 21st
century technology which sends Cooper and his mates to space, the kinks
in Interstellar’s design are there
for all to see. Plot holes and potholes arrive in equal measure, the pacing tied
up in loopholes and knots. You can feel the narrative trip up on itself time
and time again and yet, through wholehearted balls-out sincerity, the film still triumphs.
This is, after all, what it's all about. How often do we hear directors waxing on about capturing what it really felt like to “go to the movies”? Well. Here. It. Fucking. Is. Christopher Nolan truly believes
in cinema, and space exploration, and the human experience. It's up there in every heartfelt 70mm frame (he even still shoots on those dusty old things). So hunt down the biggest IMAX theatre you can; sit precariously close to the screen. Feel your neck creak back; feel the faux leather squeak as you grip the armrest of your seat. Feel the great sweeps and blows of Hans Zimmer's chords; the crisp, stillness of Saturn's rings; the overwhelming vastness and silence of space; and the delicate wonder of our unique place within it.
And remember how it felt. Life’s terribly short after all...
Relatively speaking of course.
