Interstellar
Nov. 16th, 2014 01:01 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
migmitUntil now, I always answered any questions about this movie with short remarks. Like "don't waste your time", or something like that. But now I have some free time, so I figured, why not try and review it properly? If anything, Nolan deserves to be taken seriously. When Coen brothers make something terrible, you just shrug and say "well, that's Coen brothers, it's what they do". But Nolan, let me remind you, created such masterpieces as "Inception" and "Memento", and "Batman begins" was pretty good too.
Just a warning. I'm going to put some spoilers here. Big ones. I'm not writing for the newspaper; I'm writing to my personal blog. So, you've been warned.
So, "Interstellar". Let's see what we've got.
1) Plot. A good plot seemed to be the greatest virtue of Nolan films so far. And it's very hard to make a good movie without a good plot. There are examples of that, like Bergman's "Smultronstället" ("Wild Strawberries"), but only a few of them. Even geniuses like Bergman do not succeed every time they attempt something like this.
And the plot here is really bad. Let me give you a few examples.
The characters are looking for a new home for Earth population. A while ago a few people were sent to different planets (only one astronaut per planet) and three of them sent back a confirmation that the planet is good and can serve it's purpose. Due to the lack of fuel, our heroes must choose which of those planets to visit, and they eventually choose one that was studied by the leader of the previous mission, Dr. Mann. He is still on the planet, and, after landing there, they'll take him back to Earth.
From that description it should be completely obvious to you (even if you didn't see the movie) that Dr. Mann is a liar who just (correctly) guessed that otherwise he won't be rescued. And that's exactly what happens here. The situation could be saved if Dr. Mann just admitted his lie and begged the main characters to forgive him. But no. Mann, unable to hide the fact that the planet can't be the new home of humanity, tries to kill everyone and get back to Earth alone on their spaceship. I don't know what could be more hackneyed than that. And, of course, he fails.
Another example. Why the Earth population even needs the new home? Because edible plants on Earth slowly die. It seems that there are two reasons for that: thick dust that somehow flows through the air and covers everything, and some pathogen. Yeah. So, instead of fixing the problem on Earth, they decide to just pick a completely different planet and try to make it habitable. Does it really seem easier? Well... not to me.
Or the use of aliens here. Aliens don't appear on screen (thankfully), but it seems that they created the wormhole in the Solar system, that allows humans to reach other planets. Throughout the movie, there is more evidence that aliens are, in fact, quite fond of humanity and did that specifically to facilitate humans' escape.
That much I can buy. There are additional questions — like, why didn't they create their wormhole closer to Earth, so that it would be easier to reach — but that's more or less OK. But later characters of the movie make two statements. First, aliens are "five-dimensional" creatures, they don't understand the concept of time, and, therefore, they need humans to do most of the job. And, secondly, aliens are really humans from the future, just very advanced.
You do see the problem here, right? Like, these two statements are in direct contradiction? What's more, neither of them is substantiated by the evidence, it's completely unclear how the main characters figured this out.
2) Acting. Not much to say here. Nolan, as usual, doesn't give the actors much to work with. While that worked with aforementioned "Inception" and was a bliss with "Memento", whose lead actor was just unable to act, here it doesn't work. Because of the difficulties with the plot. And Mr. McConaughey, who plays the main character here, isn't a good enough actor to overcome the limitations. In fact, as former space pilot turned farmer, who returns to being space pilot, he seems more interested, more alive, when he works on a farm, than when he flies the ship through space. And that contradicts his repeated statements that he hates the farm and was born to fly.
3) Scientific background. That was another thing that was well handled in, say, "Inception". Of course, the premise of "going into the mind of a sleeping person" was completely fantastical, but at least some consequences were well tied to the real world — like gravity. When the characters are sleeping in a van, and that van falls freely, there is no gravity in their dreams.
"Interstellar" instead sells itself as a "hard sci-fi", which follows the laws of physics as close as possible. OK, let me just give you an example.
"Hey, let's send a probe to the black hole, so that it would send back information about what's inside".
I kid you not.
And then they do exactly that. And a human — the main character — goes in along with the probe. What tidal forces?
At least this astronaut, as well as the robot doubling as a probe, didn't manage to send a signal outside. That's good. Why did he ever thought he would be able to do so is incomprehensible. I guess he was really stupid. But then there comes the part where he encounters a strange place inside a black hole that lets him communicate with his daughter who is still on Earth, sending all the collected data about black hole to her. In Morse code. Erm... isn't ASCII better for that? And, I don't know how much data he was sending, but I'm pretty certain that it was several megabytes at least. So... how long did his daughter stay there, writing down his messages? Months?
Anyway. If you want hard sci-fi, read "Martian" by Andy Weir, and do not watch this.
Was there anything good about the movie? Yes. But only one thing. Robots. Robots were helping people. Not one of them went on a murderous rampage due to some technical problems. And I especially liked the fact the were not made humanoid without any reason; instead, they generally were just big black boxes. Some thought was obviously given to their design, which made their movements (sometimes very fast) quite believable.
But that is not enough for a 3-hours movie. And, not to end this review on a positive note, here is, again, something regarding the plot.
I'm OK when an astronaut who landed in water says "Damn, our engines are wet, so, let's pump some oxigen into them; that way we would be able to make the fuel burn". I don't know if it's something that could work in reality, but at least it seems believable on screen. But, instead, we get this: "Damn, our engines are wet; we have to wait for an hour until they dry out, despite the fact that every second counts now. <skip almost an hour> Oh, there is a huge wave coming to us, and we need a few minutes more; let's pump some oxigen into the engines; that way we would be able to make the fuel burn". Erm... why didn't you do the same thing an hour ago? Or a minute ago, for that matter?
Bad movie. Bad Nolan. No cookie for him.
Just a warning. I'm going to put some spoilers here. Big ones. I'm not writing for the newspaper; I'm writing to my personal blog. So, you've been warned.
So, "Interstellar". Let's see what we've got.
1) Plot. A good plot seemed to be the greatest virtue of Nolan films so far. And it's very hard to make a good movie without a good plot. There are examples of that, like Bergman's "Smultronstället" ("Wild Strawberries"), but only a few of them. Even geniuses like Bergman do not succeed every time they attempt something like this.
And the plot here is really bad. Let me give you a few examples.
The characters are looking for a new home for Earth population. A while ago a few people were sent to different planets (only one astronaut per planet) and three of them sent back a confirmation that the planet is good and can serve it's purpose. Due to the lack of fuel, our heroes must choose which of those planets to visit, and they eventually choose one that was studied by the leader of the previous mission, Dr. Mann. He is still on the planet, and, after landing there, they'll take him back to Earth.
From that description it should be completely obvious to you (even if you didn't see the movie) that Dr. Mann is a liar who just (correctly) guessed that otherwise he won't be rescued. And that's exactly what happens here. The situation could be saved if Dr. Mann just admitted his lie and begged the main characters to forgive him. But no. Mann, unable to hide the fact that the planet can't be the new home of humanity, tries to kill everyone and get back to Earth alone on their spaceship. I don't know what could be more hackneyed than that. And, of course, he fails.
Another example. Why the Earth population even needs the new home? Because edible plants on Earth slowly die. It seems that there are two reasons for that: thick dust that somehow flows through the air and covers everything, and some pathogen. Yeah. So, instead of fixing the problem on Earth, they decide to just pick a completely different planet and try to make it habitable. Does it really seem easier? Well... not to me.
Or the use of aliens here. Aliens don't appear on screen (thankfully), but it seems that they created the wormhole in the Solar system, that allows humans to reach other planets. Throughout the movie, there is more evidence that aliens are, in fact, quite fond of humanity and did that specifically to facilitate humans' escape.
That much I can buy. There are additional questions — like, why didn't they create their wormhole closer to Earth, so that it would be easier to reach — but that's more or less OK. But later characters of the movie make two statements. First, aliens are "five-dimensional" creatures, they don't understand the concept of time, and, therefore, they need humans to do most of the job. And, secondly, aliens are really humans from the future, just very advanced.
You do see the problem here, right? Like, these two statements are in direct contradiction? What's more, neither of them is substantiated by the evidence, it's completely unclear how the main characters figured this out.
2) Acting. Not much to say here. Nolan, as usual, doesn't give the actors much to work with. While that worked with aforementioned "Inception" and was a bliss with "Memento", whose lead actor was just unable to act, here it doesn't work. Because of the difficulties with the plot. And Mr. McConaughey, who plays the main character here, isn't a good enough actor to overcome the limitations. In fact, as former space pilot turned farmer, who returns to being space pilot, he seems more interested, more alive, when he works on a farm, than when he flies the ship through space. And that contradicts his repeated statements that he hates the farm and was born to fly.
3) Scientific background. That was another thing that was well handled in, say, "Inception". Of course, the premise of "going into the mind of a sleeping person" was completely fantastical, but at least some consequences were well tied to the real world — like gravity. When the characters are sleeping in a van, and that van falls freely, there is no gravity in their dreams.
"Interstellar" instead sells itself as a "hard sci-fi", which follows the laws of physics as close as possible. OK, let me just give you an example.
"Hey, let's send a probe to the black hole, so that it would send back information about what's inside".
I kid you not.
And then they do exactly that. And a human — the main character — goes in along with the probe. What tidal forces?
At least this astronaut, as well as the robot doubling as a probe, didn't manage to send a signal outside. That's good. Why did he ever thought he would be able to do so is incomprehensible. I guess he was really stupid. But then there comes the part where he encounters a strange place inside a black hole that lets him communicate with his daughter who is still on Earth, sending all the collected data about black hole to her. In Morse code. Erm... isn't ASCII better for that? And, I don't know how much data he was sending, but I'm pretty certain that it was several megabytes at least. So... how long did his daughter stay there, writing down his messages? Months?
Anyway. If you want hard sci-fi, read "Martian" by Andy Weir, and do not watch this.
Was there anything good about the movie? Yes. But only one thing. Robots. Robots were helping people. Not one of them went on a murderous rampage due to some technical problems. And I especially liked the fact the were not made humanoid without any reason; instead, they generally were just big black boxes. Some thought was obviously given to their design, which made their movements (sometimes very fast) quite believable.
But that is not enough for a 3-hours movie. And, not to end this review on a positive note, here is, again, something regarding the plot.
I'm OK when an astronaut who landed in water says "Damn, our engines are wet, so, let's pump some oxigen into them; that way we would be able to make the fuel burn". I don't know if it's something that could work in reality, but at least it seems believable on screen. But, instead, we get this: "Damn, our engines are wet; we have to wait for an hour until they dry out, despite the fact that every second counts now. <skip almost an hour> Oh, there is a huge wave coming to us, and we need a few minutes more; let's pump some oxigen into the engines; that way we would be able to make the fuel burn". Erm... why didn't you do the same thing an hour ago? Or a minute ago, for that matter?
Bad movie. Bad Nolan. No cookie for him.
no subject
Date: 2014-11-16 03:52 pm (UTC)Yes. I don't think there were much data. Maybe some formulae and main princples, enough to finish the equations.
>Beautiful scenes with ridiculous explanations. Always a bad idea.
Then switch to Discovery channel and stop watching sci-fi. Today.
no subject
Date: 2014-11-16 03:59 pm (UTC)Which would make this robot a scientist.
> Then switch to Discovery channel and stop watching sci-fi. Today.
I think I'll live without you telling me what to watch.