Going into Interstellar, you want it to work. Just the idea of two major studios working together to give acclaimed filmmaker Christopher Nolan a blank check can make a moviegoer excited. But Interstellar is the poster child for what can happen when a director isn't on a leash, when he is given no boundaries and allows his influences to get in the way of just giving audiences an entertaining movie.
Matthew McConaughey stars as Cooper, a pilot forced to be a farmer because of the worldwide blight that is slowly destroying all food on earth. Suddenly, a mysterious force shows up in his daughter's bedroom and leads him to NASA's secret headquarters. There, he learns of a plan to save humanity from Professor Brand (Nolan's top exposition man, Michael Caine). NASA plans to send a crew of just four astronauts through a wormhole near Saturn to another galaxy, where they will (hopefully) find a new planet where humanity can survive.
Now, this sounds like a pretty simplistic plot. But, just like Inception, Nolan continues to build ideas that complicate things, even though this film did begin with an idea from his brother and Dark Knight collaborator, Jonathan Nolan. Twists are thrown in to derail audience expectations, new directions require clunky confusing speeches and plot holes are frequently left empty. (The biggest one – why exactly was there a blight that wiped out food? - isn't really answered.) Filmmakers certainly should leave things to the imagination to keep viewers engaged, but Nolan pushes that limit in Interstellar.
The best parts of Interstellar are the moments when science isn't the top priority. Nolan fills the screen with awe-inspiring vistas of space – the shot of Saturn might even cause one to shed a tear. An entire sequence with Matt Damon on an ice planet is the most thrilling section, where Nolan shows off the skill of filming fights he picked up during the Dark Knight movies. It keeps you on edge, just like the best moments in Gravity. In these scenes, Nolan is a filmmaker first, leaving philosophy at the theater door.
Still, Nolan is more interested in emulating his obvious idol, Stanley Kubrick, and tries desperately to turn this into 2001: A Space Odyssey at the end. Indeed, each hour of the film feels like distinctly different science fiction movies. The earth-bound opening is akin to Close Encounters of the Third Kind, with scientists scrambling to solve a mystery. In the second, more action-packed hour, Nolan pulls cards out of the Alien deck, throwing surprises at us. Lastly, he hits the 2001 button, coming up with a final sequence that questions our existence and brings the movie full circle.
Nolan is the only filmmaker who could possibly make a single movie inspired by so many different styles work. Interstellar does it well at some points and falters at others, specifically with the attempt at making a new 2001. Nolan is too interested in human emotions to be a modern-day Stanley Kubrick. Overall, Interstellar really does have more in common with Steven Spielberg, as there is an emotional heart at its center.
Also, don't go into this expecting a Dallas Buyers Club-level performance from McConaughey. As the audience's emotional center for the journey, he spends a lot of time listening. Later in the film, when the scientific speeches become rare, McConaughey begins to take back the movie, though. The really stellar performance here comes from Jessica Chastain, who plays the older version of Cooper's daughter, Murph. Sadly, she doesn't get a lot of scenes, but she kills it every time she's on screen.
But McConaughey, Chastain and Anne Hathaway aren't the stars of this movie. Nolan has become the star, a guy who would have had his name above the title in the old days. As a Nolan movie, the dialogue and acting take a back seat to the visual marvels and expertly directed spectacle. Therefore, Interstallar is the perfect Christopher Nolan movie, but not exactly the best movie overall.
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