Interstellar

Interstellar (2014)

Runtime: 169 minutes

Directed by: My favorite director, Christopher Nolan

Starring: Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain, Michael Caine, Mackenzie Foy

From: Paramount/Warner Brothers

There is a story of how I got to see this movie in a unique manner and it was a day trip, but worth it. I'll explain it all in the long Letterboxd review I did, included below. I'll return tomorrow night with a shorter review.

(I apologize for the length of this review but I wanted to give a backstory so I can explain how I saw this in a unique fashion and also explain what I think of the director and how I really did try to go into this with an open mind. I hope this isn't a “lol, too long, didn't read” sort of thing for most people)

I went on a journey to see this film, not like the trip Cooper went on but still a longer one than I usually take to see something on the big screen. Before that, though, I need to mention how I feel about director Christopher Nolan and his films; I certainly haven't seen them all but the ones I have, there have been more misses than hits.

Maybe it's the whole comic book thing and how I don't read them and I rarely see comic book movies but I think that Batman Begins (which I rated as 2 stars) and The Dark Knight Rises (at the time 2 ½ stars but if I could stomach another viewing I know I'd rate it lower) are both not good and even though I enjoy The Dark Knight its general plot and Heath Ledger's performance are big reasons for that and even I can acknowledge all three movies have badly filmed action scenes, more plot holes than a wheel of Swiss cheese and a lot of illogical moments. He also makes the same sorts of mistakes that "lesser" filmmakers get crap for and yet he somehow always is immune to him being spotlighted for those sins.

Yet most people love him to the point that they'd have his babies if they could! I don't get it. I don't want to say “Emperor with no clothes” as it sounds like I am giving a middle finger in particular to my followers who think he's God's Gift to Cinema, but it is an apt analogy.

Yet, I still made a drive to Tampa (about an hour and a half from where I live) to see the movie in 70mm IMAX*, as this was my virgin experience seeing a feature film in that legendary format, and to be frank that was more a factor in me wanting to see the movie than the actual film, despite it getting a lot of (not unanimous) praise for its greatness from the few dozen of the people I follow having already seen it.

That is why I spent an afternoon and evening and into the late night driving there and back to see it on a giant “real” IMAX screen at the city's museum. It was actually a dome IMAX setup, meaning the screening was in a dome structure and the image was projected on half of the dome, with everyone seated at an angle to see the massive view. It may sound odd but it works quite well and needless to say the picture and the sound were both tremendous.

As for why I gave this movie the rating I did (lower than what most people here have given it), let me explain. I am not going to fault the film for trying to be super ambitious, telling an epic story involving a future Earth that sad to say isn't so far-fetched in my eyes. I have no idea what exactly happened that caused the ecological disaster in this world presented in the movie but maybe that wasn't important aside from saying that “Earth is f*****”.

By the way, I prefer something with big ideas like that rather than the offal and utter garbage that litters major cinema this day, with corporate BS and pointless reboots/remakes that I generally avoid on general principle, not to mention atrocities such as The Transformers franchise. Lord knows I SHOULD enjoy it that a guy is able to make big budget movies that aren't mindless crap but instead try to be intelligent, and tries to be practical instead of solely relying on CGI. Unfortunately...

The movie certainly is filmed well, and it wasn't even done with Nolan's usual cinematographer. I won't fault the actors for the material they were given; all do at least a fine job, with Matthew McConaughey being the highlight. You can tell he put a lot into the role, one that required many different emotions, and acting-wise he was the highlight, but little girl Mackenzie Foy as the 10 year daughter known as Murph (as in Murphy; is Nolan a big RoboCop fan?) also did a swell job. The musical score from Hans Zimmer wasn't like anything I had heard from him before. I saw someone else describe it as being Philip Glass and I'll go with that for comparison's sake. I did enjoy it and it was an asset for the film.

Unfortunately, what I didn't like about the film was its story, which is a huge problem. In short, it left me cold; that's an issue when it's supposed to be an epic about how several people are bravely risking their lives and leaving their families behind in order to try and save humanity. Sure, the relationship between Cooper and Murph was nice and all; other than that, the movie was just cold to me, and there being plotholes and ridiculous contrivance after ridiculous contrivance that don't seem realistic at all, it turned me off.

Another issue was the dialogue and it does what Nolan always does, and instead of sounding natural it is EPIC PROCLAMATION after EPIC PROCLAMATION and I have hated that crap for years now. There's also at least one big speech that's supposed to be profound but it's more “guffaw-inducing” and “eye-rolling” than anything else. Then there's the ending... I heard it described beforehand as a deus ex machina, and I probably would have thought of it on my own had I not heard it. I also groaned when it happened, but now I can laugh that this big movie ended in such a goofy contrived way.

So, seeing it in such a fashion was a cool experience. I just wish that I could be over the moon with it like most other people are, instead of wondering if I'll ever see a film from its director ever again, as obviously he doesn't make motion pictures for me. If most others love it, great. I just don't get it and from my viewpoint, Christopher Nolan is still naked.

* By the way I am glad that at least the film's website has a great breakdown of which theatre is showing the film in which format. That is how I discovered this showing.